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What next for the Tories? Set up local Soviet Councils prehaps? It seems that the Tory Party wants less market forces and more local political planning of the economy in order to stop local shops from closing.
But if enough local people wanted local shops to survive at the expense of supermarkets and out-of-town shopping centres, they would indeed already be voting for them… with their wallets and credit cards. Yet that notion seems not to compute with ‘Conservative’ Nick Hurd, the MP for Ruislip-Northwood. Presumably what he wants to ‘conserve’ is the power of local political activists by giving them even more power to decide who can and cannot make money in local communities. More ‘direct democracy’, eh Nick?
I must say the Spanish solution to people who cannot restrain themselves from meddling in the lives of others who want to just go about their business starts to look more appealing by the day.
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I listened to the little twerp on the Today programme. His plan, at least as expressed by him, was barely comprehensible. It seemed to consist of compelling central government to produce an “action plan” but this one would be different because it would require “real” involvement with “local communiities.” The second element was to require central government to report on how they spent money at a “local level.” The purpose of this is to allow “local communities” to put pressure on government to spend that money in a different way.
So, on the plus side it didn’t seem to do anything as evil as banning companies with revenues over a certain amount from setting up in designated locations. It is just more of the same bureaucratic circle jerk. Maybe the little twerp has a consultancy business that will profit from it.
This is a LOCAL shop
For LOCAL people
Nothing for YOU Here!
Which is why it went out of business
This really is unspeakable in the way it is being sold: local shops for local people and other such rubbish. In that it follows the stomach-churning precedent of several other recent Tory campaigns. Cf, “Save the NHS from Gordon’s cuts.” (You know, the “cuts” involving doubling of current expenditure, and an off-balance-sheet capital splurge of unquantifiable size.)
What’s quite interesting about it as a political tactic, though, is that beneath the rhetoric it does restore some autonomy for local councils in spending vis-a-vis Whitehall, and it is a pre-emption of a much nastier Local Government Bill due from the Government later this year. The Government therefore has to stop it, but in a way that isn’t obvious, or the Millipede can be called to account for defecting from the greenish cause. Meanwhile it creates a platform for attacking the appalling totalitarianism of caring that will be the Local Government Bill.
The cunning involved is further underlined by the fact that this is a Bill that was being touted by Charter 88, a bien pensant constitutional reform group, so the Tories can, at relatively little cost (the Government will find a way to stop the Bill, by squeezing its timetable most likely) cosy up to two middle-class movements that have hitherto held them to be the spawn of Satan..
I used to be almost left-wing. The thing which made me search out a new path was getting utterly bored with folks wittering on about how their wonderful video store had folded and Blockbuster had opened up instead. Or Starbucks rather than their favoured coffee house, or Subway rather than a little sandwich shop ad-sodding-nauseum.
Now, I’m no fan of Starbucks or Blockbuster but I don’t feel government coercion is needed to keep them out of my parish. All I have to do is patronise the alternatives. Duh. It’s that sodding simple.
D’ya follow. D’ya see where I parted company with the left? It was shortly after a diatribe about “local” video stores being forced out of biz by Blockbuster from someone who didn’t even own a VCR!
Not that I give a flying one about these chains setting up in my neighbourhood. I don’t give a monkey’s but if an alternative store offers a better deal I’ll vote with my Visa card. I actually like the competition the chains provide because it means that the independents that do thrive have to raise their game.
It is odd that some protesters against supermarkets think the council has too much power and is able to grant permisison to such entities. Is it Carmarthen that has their market at risk from the council…and surprise surprise a superstore are in the wings waiting to redevelop?
If a redeveloper is asked to fund or invest in such a way so that money can stick to the fingers of those in the council who handle it, then the free market is not operating. Putting in yet more local control just opens up the opportunity for more local corruption.
If something is wrong it is better to dismantle, overhaul and improve what is causing the problem than introduce yet another layer/widget/thingamy to compensate for the problems that exist.
If a town or village will be so dramatically affected, then I would have thought a referrendum by residents would be in order.
There is a big “Tesco” a few hundred yards from my home. There are also several “corner shops” a few hundred yards from my home. These business enterprises have coexisted for many years.
I could try and explain this to the “Conservatives”, but to judge by their national and local antics I do not think they would understand.
I think dear Margaret should have a word in iDaves shell like over this one.
Like her, I come from a small business background.
The way my parents suceeded was to be acutely aware of, and responsive to, the needs of our customers. For instance, 80% of our trade was home delivery.
She was also very aware of the corruption endemic in the 5th rate minds who are attracted to local politics.
That’s why she closed down the GLC.
I use local shops as much as possible, but because of their speciality and convenience to me, not because they look pretty on the high street.
Other factors are at work. It is all very well to posit more powers for local govt, when the ones they already have are contributing to the destruction of our high streets.
Council tax and business rates in Bristol are combining to drive small business into the ground or away to cheaper areas because large chains can absorb the costs and single small businesses cannot.
I think you misconceive the nature of the political enterprise, Paul. What politicians say is not a measure of what they understand, it is a measure of what they take the public to understand.