RADCLIFFE town centre landlords have been told to clean up their act.

Bury South MP Ivan Lewis says the people of Radcliffe do not expect miracles but they do deserve a town centre which has a long term future.

He met with Mr James Charlton, a representative of London and Associated, the company which owns a number of shop units in Radcliffe, on Monday to discuss the deteriorating condition of the shop exteriors, vacant units and business rates.

Mr Lewis, who was joined by Radcliffe councillor Kevin Scarlett and council officials, said: "Dirty shop fronts, empty units and excessive business rates are holding back efforts to regenerate Radcliffe. I am not prepared to sit back and allow those with responsibility to avoid taking action.

"I made it clear to Mr Charlton that I expect London and Associated to clean up the shop fronts. Further improvements such as redecoration and repairing broken roofs are also issues for discussion."

Mr Lewis will contact British Gas and Norweb, urging them to seek tenants urgently for the empty units they continue to lease.

He also intends to ask the District valuer to review rate levels which are crippling both existing and prospective traders. Mr Charlton described the meeting as a "very useful exchange".

He said: "It gave us a chance to explain the difficulties we are having with units outside of our control."

But Mr Lewis's efforts have not met with the approval of the chairman of Radcliffe Traders' Association, Mr Peter Royle. "He is not talking on behalf of the tenants," he said. "There's been no contact with us."

Mr Royle, who is unimpressed by the latest development, is not optimistic about the probable outcome.

He added: "We've been down this road before. All that happens is the landlords use a financial sledgehammer to beat people into submission.

"They say they are landlords, not property developers, and although they have agreed in the past to improve the shops, they expect the tenants to pay for it."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.