Independent Retailers

Debate between Geoffrey Cox and Brian Binley

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Westminster Hall

[Mr Geoffrey Cox (Torridge and West Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Weir, and to have secured this debate on so important a subject. I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister to his position—this is my first opportunity to do so on the Floor of the House—and I know he will fill it with considerable distinction. When occasionally I give the odd, not criticism but constructive prod, I hope he will forgive me and take it in the spirit in which it is intended.

This afternoon is an opportunity for friends of the Government—those who support them—who represent market towns and town centres all around the country to draw to their attention the important predicaments, problems and issues that business people, particularly small business people and independent retailers in high streets and town centres, have confided in us. A great deal of hope is reposed in this Government.

On Monday, I attended a business breakfast with the Tavistock chamber of commerce. Broadly speaking, my experience is that local business people in my constituency—I would expect this to be replicated throughout constituencies in the south-west and beyond—are understanding of the Government’s economic policy. They perceive that dealing with the financial crisis that we inherited was the overwhelming priority for this Government. They understand that the necessity of controlling the deficit and getting on top of it was all-consuming, and that for the past six months Ministers in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the Treasury and throughout the Government have been concentrating on that essential task.

Business people in my constituency are now looking for what the Government will do to stimulate growth. What will they do in terms of the range of measures available to them, given that they are hedged in by economic circumstances? What can they do to foster prosperity and to enable businesses to get going, which they will if they are given the means?

In respect of the high street—which I intend to concentrate on this afternoon, specifically high streets in market towns, four of which I represent—I want to have a word or two with the Minister and recommend several things. In doing so, I shall crib shamelessly from the Conservatives’ commission into small shops in the high street, on which I had the privilege of sitting, and which reported in July 2008. I am delighted to see in his place its distinguished chairman, my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Mr Binley), who presided so expertly over that meticulous examination of all the issues that affect independent retailers. The commission included many people of great expertise, and I commend it to the Minister as a template for Government policy on this important subject, at least at the beginning.

The distinctive character of a town—its sense of place and individuality—is substantially created by the diversity and quality of the retailers on the high street who provide personal service and much of the town’s variety and interest to visitors. Empty shops, an increasing number of charity shops and dilapidated town centres affect the morale of a community. They deter visitors and lead to further decline. Last year, 12,000 independent shops closed.

I unashamedly declare that my focus today is on the market town. I have four of them in my constituency: Tavistock, Holsworthy, Great Torrington and Bideford, each with its own unique identity and traditions, and strong communities. Their business people are resourceful. In Holsworthy, they have joined together under the banner of the chamber of trade to create the Holscard, a loyalty scheme that entitles members who sign up and obtain the card free of charge to discounts and special offers.

Each year, the Tavistock food festival attracts a large number of local food producers who show off the extraordinary variety, sophistication and quality of food that our area has to offer. The chamber of commerce and other business organisations are active in supporting events that enhance the vitality of the town’s appeal to visitors. This Friday, Tavistock will have its Dickensian evening, which I strongly recommend to the Minister. It is great fun, and it heralds the real start of Christmas festivities in the town. The main streets are closed to traffic, all the shops are open until 9 pm, and the chamber of commerce organises a vast range of different activities: choirs, brass bands, a woodwind band, a fire eater, jugglers and morris dancers, to name but a few. Many of the shopkeepers dress up in Victorian costumes and hand out mulled wine to their regular customers as a way of thanking them for their custom throughout the year. There is a serious purpose to the evening. It attracts 12,000 visitors to the town who spend money in the local shops, and many return throughout the year. The town is also in the process of setting up a business improvement district.

Great Torrington’s rich civil war history provided the backdrop for its community development trust to set up Torrington 1646, a fascinating historical “time machine” which takes visitors, including schoolchildren, back to the days of the civil war and allows them to experience life in the town during that era. The trust has refurbished the Victorian pannier market to create a modern retail space and has enhanced the appearance of the town centre.

The Bideford 500 project to rediscover and promote the proud history of the town is well under way. It was in and from the port of Bideford that Grenville built his ships and set sail on his Elizabethan adventures, and some of the first settlers in America also started from there. The project complements the Bideford regeneration initiative that will redevelop important sites around the town.

I mention those few examples of the initiative, ingenuity and activity of local business people to demonstrate to the Minister that those communities have not sat back and declined to take responsibility for their own future. They are not without the will to seize control and to take into their own hands the initiative and responsibility for improving their lot, but they have not always felt that the Government, both local and national, have been on their side. It is to that end that I urge the Minister, after just six months in government, to bend his intellect and the resources of Government.

Times are tough. Small independent retailers and many other small businesses face increasing competition from the internet. They face often unfair competition from supermarket giants with their free out-of-town parking, and their ability to sell below cost to persuade customers through the door while they recoup the cost on other products. The Office of Fair Trading reported in 2006 that 1.8% of grocery lines were sold below cost. That sounds a small amount, but shrewdly shifting discount offers from product to product is a powerful commercial tool that represents a major disadvantage to independent retailers in the high street, as my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South noted in the small shops commission report. In addition, of course, businesses cannot escape the inevitable difficulties of the prevailing national economic situation. Next year, VAT will rise to 20%, fuel prices are high, and shoppers are drawing in their horns and spending less.

As I said, I attended a business breakfast with members of the Tavistock chamber of commerce on Monday. I found a ready recognition of and support for the Government’s compelling priority of mastering the unprecedented peacetime deficit left by Labour. Not a single voice was raised against that Government policy in this crucial regard. The overall direction of our national economic policy is fully understood and supported by small business people.

I know that the Minister, together with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is now concentrating on the measures necessary to stimulate and facilitate the private sector growth that will be essential to our economic recovery. The Minister’s Department will be central to that mission, as will others, and I venture to suggest to him that there needs to be concerted and co-ordinated action, in which all Departments, as well as local government, play a part.

In respect, however, of the vital need for leadership and the critical importance of local and national Government co-operating to support small businesses in town centres and on high streets, I have found apprehension, based not on the abilities of our Minister or on the willingness of our Government, but on experience of the previous Government. Small businesses are apprehensive about the necessary leadership being there to support the work they are doing to improve the situation. One local business man joked that the best way to start a small business under Labour was to buy a big one and wait. I am confident that the Minister and this Government will not be found wanting in that regard.

[Mr Brian Binley (Northampton South) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Weir.

Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that local government has, in fact, a major part to play in aiding small businesses? We have seen parking charges increase to the point at which they are stopping people coming into town centres, and there is no ability to stop and shop for a short period. There is piecemeal planning, which cuts out small units for people to start up, and there is an unrealistic attitude to rateable values, which is not directly related to local government but related to government more generally. Out-of-town development has become a much more valuable area in which to do business than many of our town centres, and yet town centres are still rated very highly. I could go on, but do we not need to draw to the Minister’s attention the import of local government, and the fact that it has hampered small and medium-sized businesses in our town centres for a considerable time?