Future of Town Centres and High Streets

I welcome the Portas review, which is well researched. It makes 28 excellent recommendations, many of which I agree with. Portas mentions out-of-town supermarkets and shopping centres. My constituency has not had any of those for 15 years; it has had town centre supermarkets and town centre shopping centres, which are a lot better than those out of town. However, in Prestatyn, in my constitutency, Somerfield and Tesco each owned half of one such site, and I believe that some of the supermarkets have land banks. These are not so much about developing their own stores as about keeping other stores out, and that issue needs addressing if we are to develop town centres. Where town centre developments are coming, the time scale should not be 15 years; it should be a lot shorter. When these town centre shopping centres are built, the impact on the local community should also be assessed. While there is a lot of building, disruption and road works, the Valuation Office Agency should be proactive and should give businesses the forms to apply for a rate reduction. This should not be left to happenstance or accident. Let me also pay tribute to Tesco. When it said it was going to establish stores in my constituency, in Prestatyn and at the Cathco site in Denbigh, I wrote and asked whether it would take 50% of its employees from the dole register, and it agreed. There can be some positive benefits. If companies are developing near the town centre, they need to be integrated as far as possible with the town centre, with lots of coach parking that will benefit not just the shopping centre but the high street, too. My constituency is blessed with a long-established market in Prestatyn. A market has just been established in Rhyl by a man called Ray Worsnop without a penny from the public purse. He set it up, he made mistakes but it is now up to 50 stalls strong in the centre of Rhyl high street. When someone is trying to establish a new market there are often tensions in the community. As Mary Portas says, we should establish markets and even car boot sales in the town centre.