The Future of the High Street

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Thursday 10th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

Let me take a moment to praise those of my constituents and elsewhere who are in the frontline of retail and our high streets; it is a rewarding job but it can be tough. I spent many years as a retail employee on the shop floor, but I cannot imagine the difficulties they have had to face this year.

Without doubt it has been an incredibly difficult time for those working on the high street, and for businesses there. In the highlands, some 90% of registered businesses are small businesses. They are not just places we go to shop, be entertained and enjoy ourselves; they are absolutely part of the fabric of what we have in our high streets, towns and villages, and in the city they are much loved institutions. We are talking about innovative people who develop businesses that always give us a warm welcome. Obviously, they are joined by national retailers on the high streets, but with the recent demise of some of the big players they lose the opportunity for additional footfall. So we need in future to concentrate heavily on what we do to provide support. This has now become an urgent issue for us all to pay attention to.

We have heard time and again in the Chamber that the demise of the high street is not new and that it is something that we have seen coming, but it has been accelerated to the nth degree. I echo the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Richard Thomson), who spoke about the Scottish Government having done everything they can to provide necessary support. There is a madness in cancelling the duty free allowances from the UK Government, and they must take more measures so that we can take more action ourselves, especially over simple changes to the borrowing rules to help those who need it.

The high street is not dead. It simply needs to evolve. In my constituency, independent retailers are some of the best examples of innovation, and they are reaching out to their customers—many through their own websites now. I urge us all to do what we can. I hope that the light at the end of the tunnel will be us becoming more conscious consumers. We want to support the right businesses doing the right thing. Ethical and local purchasing, and an increased awareness of our own carbon footprint, should naturally drive us to our own independent retailers. There is lots that the UK Government can do. The Scottish Government must do more. Local authorities must work together with business communities, developers and residents to redesign our high streets, and businesses themselves should be recommending each other to other businesses.

There is much more I could say, but three minutes is not enough to cover this subject in detail. We must all do more to support the high street and retailers in our local communities.