Pendle MP joins call for more shops help (From Lancashire Telegraph)

can our elected please explain when 1 club and 4 pubs shut over the last 3 years did nothing to help them.one barnoldswick councillor . said who cares its like cowboy time at midnight anyway.on a friday and saturday.the real truth was 4 pubs and 1 club not psaying any tax anymore and around 25 people on the dole.no council tax either for these buildings.think its about time you came to barnoldswick mr stephenson and saw for yourself...if you need directions just ask i would gladly show you where barnoldswick is.

The early day motion stares: “We believe that pubs and local independent shops are vital assets for local communities and note that 12,000 local shops closed in 2009 and that pubs are closing at a rate of 12 a week.”

In brutal terms this is simply the market process re-configuring supply to match demand, but the consequences on a personal level for shop owners and publicans who see their businesses destroyed must be distressing in the extreme.

I expect that at some point in the future the rate of closures of local independent retailers and public houses will decline. Those that remain trading will be the ones that have a business-model that is sustainable.

During recent days I have noted that the mainstream media have been giving prominence to reports from various economic groups and commentators that the worst for households is over and that next year the financial position of the personal sector will improve.

Unfortunately the media interviewers never ask these pundits the questions that I would like to hear: Firstly, can you tell us how many of your previous predictions were accurate? I suspect that the answer would be: not many. The second question would then be: why should we place any credence now on your current prediction that for households better times are ahead? Then after receiving the answer to this question, the final question that I would like to hear is: but since petrol is going to rise by 3p a litre in January, and the weather has played havoc with crop production around the globe and food prices may well be moving sharply higher how on earth can things possibly get better for households? And since you seem to be ignoring these factors wouldn’t it be reasonable for a viewer or listener to wonder what on earth you have been smoking in order to produce a prediction that seems to be so ridiculous that it’s hard for me not to laugh?

Frankly, I doubt very much that things will improve markedly for many households and that means that the travails of the retailing sector could well continue.