Lord Johnson of Marylebone
Main Page: Lord Johnson of Marylebone (Conservative - Life peer)Local High Streets
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Chris Skidmore
That is an extremely interesting point. I had not considered it, but obviously there are many shops on the high street of that nature, so such a measure would indeed be extremely valuable.
Equally promising is the £1 billion of Government funding that has been set aside for councils that welcome new housing development. They will be able to spend it to benefit their local economy. In Kingswood, there are areas of brownfield land in need of development. At the same time, there is a great need for more affordable housing in the area. The new homes bonus—the Government’s proposal to match the council tax raised from the construction of new homes, supplemented by £350 per home for the first six years—will provide the opportunity for even greater investment in Kingswood, which might be spent on improving the local high street and its surrounding areas.
Increased investment and financial incentives are vital to protecting our local high streets, but we must also address the imbalance between our historic high streets and the growth of larger out-of-town retail centres or malls. It is there that we have the chance to learn the lessons of the past, and not to penalise small businesses in favour of larger retail outlets. I welcome the change in attitude displayed in the coalition’s programme for government, which states that it
“will seek to ensure a level playing field between small and large retailers by enabling councils to take competition”—
Joseph Johnson (Orpington) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Does he agree that the Mayor of London’s Great Outdoors programme has been particularly successful? My constituency has been lucky enough to benefit from the programme; Orpington was beset by structural decline for many years, with Bluewater a few miles down the road on one side and a great shopping centre in Bromley on the other. In July this year, Orpington was lucky enough to benefit from a £2.2 million regeneration programme.
Joseph Johnson
The programme was one of 50 projects that the Great Outdoors programme has used to regenerate outdoor spaces and urban centres across the region.
Chris Skidmore
I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree that the Mayor is a great visionary, and we can learn a lot from many of the ideas that he has proposed so far during his tenure.