The town centre is approaching crisis. (Some
will claim it hit crisis some time ago, a point I am not going to dispute.)
High streets up and down the land are suffering, yet some buck the trend. Even
within the borough there is example of a high street that remains buoyant –
look at Leigh-on-Sea.
The Tory administration took a closed
shop approach to the idea of a High Street summit; I, and my colleagues,
decided this was entirely the wrong approach. If nothing else, how can the
people who have overseen its decline be best placed to reverse this?
There are many reasons for the current
state of our town centre. It is not all down to the rise of internet shopping,
or indeed those current scapegoats – the homeless.
What struck me is that we need fresh
ideas and must engage with and listen to our residents. The ‘we-know-best’
attitude of the Tories is not only arrogant, it clearly flies in defiance of
reality.
The Tories do not listen. Their great
solution is to cajole and bully the homeless to move from the relative safety
of shop doors, which solves nothing, merely moving the problem. When will they
understand that failure to properly address the failures of austerity and the
paucity of social housing has left the fifth richest nation on Earth with
increasing numbers sleeping rough.
Fortunately Labour did take a
cross-party approach to its people’s summit, and the more than seventy
residents have gave up a Wednesday evening to air their views about their
community were listened to politely. Labour (and I am sure the Liberal
Democrats and the Independent Group) will be looking at their notes from this
meeting and will be trying to effect real and positive change.
In the meantime the Tories will be
re-arranging the deck-chairs as their ship heads towards an ice-berg. Not
listening is a very bad idea.
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