Xenophon PCDGS
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How much blame would you lay at the door of car ownership in that respect.
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Should individuals who cause an economic crisis be sent to jail?
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How much blame would you lay at the door of car ownership in that respect.
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I know Wilmslow well enough to know that it is a short drive down the A34 from Wilmslow town centre to Tesco and M&S.
Essan
Member
Car ownership was also high in the 80s and 90s. The problem seems to be the inability of people to walk far from their cars. They expect to park outside the door of the shop. If they can't they go elsewhere.
In my experience there is much less "high street shopping" not just because there are fewer shops, but because to walk down the high street involves walking
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
Looking at the title of the thread, would the OP then pose the question that people should be sent to prison for causing the economic decline in town centre shopping either by the use of internet shopping or by shopping at out-of-town shopping centres?
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
Tesco would seem ideal for the residents of the Spath Lane estate or even the Colshaw Farm estate.
M&S on the other hand was famously ideal for the Beckhams when they didn't live in Handforth.
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
Have you ever seen what retail facilities are available in Nether Alderley. If you had, you would know why the Beckham's did not shop local to their residence in those days, but I assure you that Victoria Beckham was seen in both Alderley Edge and in Wilmslow retail establishments.
But also at Handforth Dean, meaning lost sales for Wilmslow town centre. I see there isn't a M&S department store in Wilmslow town centre, surprising for a town of such affluence. I can only assume that the out of town M&S means a town centre store is not viable.
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
You do not need a M&S store when, as I said in a previous posting, you have Hooper's department store, that sells far better quality clothing items, amongst other items. You need to be aware of the average clientele who use Hooper's.
Southport has an M&S store with entrances directly onto the railway station concourse.
Are you genuinely arguing that individuals who decide to shop online are mostly responsible for the decline of the high street, and people should just stop buying things online? I can't see what your viable solution is, we can't just ban online shopping
433N
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Is it that simple ?
Banks were caught with bad debts, had little money but had lots of money in illiquid assets (such as mortgaged houses) which, on paper, they have rights over. If the 'banks had not been bailed out' surely a firesale of housing would have ensued to liquidise assets and an epidemic of repossessions would have resulted.
In essence, bailing out the banks was removing the need to repossess assets and hence, the people were bailed out in effect - particularly those who had overstretched themselves (and I don't really buy into the financially-naive thing, should have paid more attention in school and/or done some research/thinking or if it was still too difficult, stayed out of the house-buying market altogether).
If the banks had gone to the wall, what would have happened to people living in mortgaged housing, would they just have got a free house ?
The housing market is now artificially overvalued and excludes younger people who weren't on the housing gravy train at the time of the crisis. So you can argue that people have higher value properties and have been enriched as a result of the 'bailing out'.
433N
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I don't know if it is just me, but a high percentage of my online purchases get returned. I'm doing more and more shopping in shops where I know what I'm getting rather than the shoddy old tat that seems to drive internet shopping these days.
I don't shop at Ama-tax-dodgers-zon now because I think we should pay tax so we can have a healthcare system.
hooverboy
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I think theres a few things affecting th high street shops
1) massively high business rates and increased regulations
2) lack of parking/pedestrianiasation of centres- people just don't want to spend hours carting half a tonne of carrier bags to bus stops
3)expensive bus fares to/from towns
4) the "atmosphere" of many towns these days is of lots of layabouts/beggars/drunkards(of various nationalities) mooching around feels tense and rather scary for elderly folks...so they don't visit.
edwin_m
Veteran Member
Nobody voted for Gordon Brown to be PM, although those who voted for Blair probably guessed he would take over at some point. At the time the alternatives weren't really credible in the period when the Tories were running through a sequence of fairly right wing and unelectable leaders.Gordon Brown, George Osborne, Boris Johnson .....
None of them would have been in a position to do anything unless the electorate had voted for them as the best, most honorable, suitable, competent, reliable, capable persons to represent them in parliament
I humbly suggest the electorate are not fit for purpose.
When people voted for the government including Osborne, the alternative was Gordon Brown. I maintain Osborne was the first populist to gain power in the UK, due to proposing extreme austerity which he knew would damage the economy but would appeal to enough voters to get them elected.
The electorate did not vote for a government led by Boris Johnson or one with its current policies, and few would have predicted that outcome in 2017.
So I'd say the electorate was largely blameless in these events.
DarloRich
Veteran Member
I agree - the government did the only thing it could which was to support the financial system lest we all went down. I am not entirely happy with how they did that but the concept was the right one.
trainophile
Established Member
Just been into TK Maxx killing time between trains, and they were promoting their online website over the PA system, so presumably they aren’t worried about online shopping damaging the high street.
Although TK Maxx is the type of shop people visit specifically for a browse, not because they need anything!
Although TK Maxx is the type of shop people visit specifically for a browse, not because they need anything!
433N
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I don't think anyone can be entirely happy with how they did it but I think we should be charitable and remember that they didn't have an awful lot of time to think it through properly.
However having made that decision, I don't think anywhere near enough has been done in recovery. I don't think banks have been reformed enough and I certainly don't believe that interest rates should have been suppressed so low for so long out of fear of people not being able to afford their mortgages.
People did not take the personal responsibilities for their borrowing seriously enough but through low interest rates, the punishment for that has been transferred to the young who cannot afford inflated house prices, the old who can't get the returns on savings that they expected and, in the future, the old because pension funds have struggled for a long time to make their projected long term gains to meet their liabilities.
I am not at all convinced that the classic Keynesian low-interest rate approach is at all appropriate for our modern day net-importing economy.
furnessvale
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Going back to the original title of the thread, would those imprisoned include trades union leaders who call unnecessary strikes?
(Goes to don tin hat!)
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
I inadvertently switched the TV to BBC News a few moments ago and saw Corbyn spout forth his usual Socialist claptrap of his and thought...."My God, does this country really want that dreary old man to take over as caretaker PM", so I thought of a better way to spend my time, switched off the TV and logged on to this website instead.
eMeS
Member
I bought some of my best coffee beans in the Milton Keynes TKMaxx. Sadly, it wasn't there the next time I went in...
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
If I ever had to recall a picture of extreme left-wing Socialist solidarity, it would be the one of the group RMT picture of senior RMT officials all with one arm raised with a clenched fist. There were some gangster-looking individuals in that picture whose individual images would strike fear in the hearts of many.
I meant to add that picture to this posting, but I cannot find it or the thread it was originally published on, but if anyone can find it and put it on a posting on this thread, I would be most grateful
433N
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No. Trade union leaders who call strikes which YOU judge to be unnecessary will not be imprisoned. Sorry 'bout that.
ON EDIT , PS : You might want to look into recent legislation regarding industrial action and update your thinking on whether there are such things as 'trade union leaders who call strikes'. The world has changed since 1970.
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DarloRich
Veteran Member
Agreed.
I agree that not enough has been done in recovery and that the banks have not been reformed well. I disagree about interest rates. We need them as low as possible.
I agree about credit. It was far too easy to borrow and it was seen as "free money". I don't about house prices or interest rates
Personally, I have little sympathy for people whining about house prices. I had to save like a b'stard for 5 or 6 years to buy my house. I didn't have help from the bank of mummy or daddy or a trust fund or a partner and my credit rating was shocking meaning i only had access to "frutiy" rates that wouldn't have looked out of place in the 1980's. I had money that I earned and money that I saved. Nothing more. It is hard and requires sacrifice but the fact it is hard is no excuse. I find it hard to have sympathy for people who "cant" afford a house but can afford the latest phone or car. Perhaps if you didn't buy those trainers or that weekend in Prague............
BTW For me and many others my house IS my pension.
I am not sure that post Brexit we will have a choice
Robin Edwards
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Who said Town Centres should be places to do your shopping?
With Respect Xen, you sound like the guy bemoaning that you can't use your horse anymore since the roads have been turned over to these confounded motor vehicles.
Trying to blame individuals for passage of time is in my view, unlikely to bring you success.
Robin Edwards
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In my experience, the 'gangsters' lie far closer to your political ideals Xen.
Trying to protect people's rights, our NHS and welfare state should not befall the 'extreme' left as you put it so maybe you're reading too much into Labour manifesto? #justsaying
You live in Darlington where a quick look at Rightmove reveals that a 2 bedroom house can be bought for about £50,000. In Dagenham in East London a quick check shows that the cheapest 2 bedroom property is £200,000 - how long do you think a young adult just starting their first job who'd grown up there would need to save for to afford it?
I'm not sure that online retail is killing the high street. Have just seen an article in Property Week that suggests online sales are higher in areas with a Bricks and mortar store than they are in areas without! Last of this is due to the use of click and collect requiring somewhere convenient to pick up goods.
What is killing the traditional retailers is more their inability to move with the times. For instance I remember looking at the BHS website in the mid 2000s - couldn't purchase anything online at the time.
What is killing the traditional retailers is more their inability to move with the times. For instance I remember looking at the BHS website in the mid 2000s - couldn't purchase anything online at the time.
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
Who said Town Centres should be places to do your shopping?
With Respect Xen, you sound like the guy bemoaning that you can't use your horse anymore since the roads have been turned over to these confounded motor vehicles.
Trying to blame individuals for passage of time is in my view, unlikely to bring you success.
Town centres were long the fulcrum point of any town since time immemorial and it is only in fairly recent times that the Houses of Mammon saw car ownership to lead to success of out of town retail shopping developments and since then, the last thirty years or so saw the internet use grow year by year and certain commercial entities saw a new market niche for internet shopping. I see you make no mention of the number of retail jobs that have been lost over the recent years, with even large well-known retail giants of the high street such as House of Fraser, Marks and Spencer, British Home Stores, etc, not protected.
I am 74 and suffered at stroke in July 2012 and have never driven since that date and my good lady wife is 77 and unfortunately in the first stages of a dementia-type affliction, causing her to stop driving immediately on the advice of her consultant, giving her Land Rover Discovery to one of my sons. We live, as many on this website already know, in an 18th century six-bedroom two story residence which originally was the land agents offices of a nearby stately home and we are two miles away from the nearest railway station and a bus stop. Indeed, I would love to have a barouche pulled by noble equine steeds as you suggest, but content ourselves that our village has a rather good executive taxi service that meets our daily needs.
433N
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That's fair enough ... and you have Mark Carney on your team but I do think alarm bells should start ringing if you are 10 years into a low interest rate 'temporary measure' and the economy is still a basket case (of course, austerity hasn't helped either) and productivity is dire. At some point you have to wonder if you are working within the correct paradigm.
As I'm sure you know, the idea behind low interest rates is to stimulate investement and encourage spending to stimulate economy ; it is not to help people pay off the debt they couldn't afford in the first place. Further, all those younglings buying iPhones (shudders) is fine IF the iPhones are made here since it creates jobs and stimulates investment ... but they aren't. If we were still a manufacturing powerhouse as in Keynes day then, yes, it would be the right approach. I remain unconvinced that it is so clear-cut now.
Who is to say that if savers got more interest, it wouldn't be spent in ways that would stimulate the economy better than paying off mortgages and buying imported goods. Perhaps pensioners would spend it on more trips to Eastbourne, staying in family-run hotels, eating more home-made ice-cream, eating more carvery meals and having an extra round of Crazy Golf on the seafront?
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
You really should try to access the said RMT photographic image, with one or two of those individuals looking like the "missing link" in human race development. The RMT as I am often informed, are naught to do with the Labour Party and the RMT actions in those many strike days were not for the benefit of the NHS and welfare state (as you state above) nor for the rights of those people who travel to work by train (commonly known in certain union
circles as "collateral damage"), but were only for those who hold membership of their own trades union.
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