SIR - Tesco-bashing continues apace in your columns so please allow me space to put some counter-arguments.
Tesco does not ‘wipe out small business owners’ as Kate Coggins chooses to believe. The shopping public does that by voting with its feet and cash.
I remember my mother buying her bread here, her meat there, her cheese and biscuits somewhere and her tea and coffee somewhere else again. It took much of the morning at least twice a week and on foot.
Need I say more to illustrate the convenience of the supermarket? By all means support the small retailer. You’ll pay a premium for your support and a change from the council to park your car some way from the independent retailer.
When did you, gentle reader, last pay to park at Tesco and within a 60-second walk from the store? There will, I hope always be a place for the independent retailer, offering specialist advice and very high quality goods. I can think of a range of such suppliers close to the town centre.
When and if the public see no advantage in patronising them, for whatever reason, then they too will go out of business. This would be no fault of any alternative suppliers. It’s called competition, which can only benefit the consumer.
John Gaisford
Barkers Lane, Bedford
Tesco consolation goal
Sir - In response to your article headed Tesco 12 Council 0 last week, it seems a bit one-sided to me and I suspect a lot of your readers.
How about we do something about it? If we as a town pull together we can make it 11-1. Not ideal but better than 12-0. We can all write to Tesco’s carol.leslie@uk.tesco.com telling her that we do not want Bedford turning into Tescotown.
We could say that there are two restrictive covenants on the Bird In Hand, Brickhill, which they should have realised when they took the lease with Charles Wells and tell them to push off.
Ian John
Brickhill Drive, Bedford
Council lets us down
Sir - With reference to the building of all the Tesco branches around the town, I cannot believe the council is unable to stop these stores opening.
Surely the council makes the final planning decisions.
If Tesco is allowed to continue in this manner, opening stores wherever it wants despite the wishes of the local people and without the attention to their wishes by the elected representatives then I consider we will have another ‘News International’ problem fast approaching as well as the horrific damage to our local businesses, which the council has promised to support.
I trust the locals will vote with their feet and refuse to use Tesco as I have been doing for several years now and will continue to do so however many are opened.
Phyllis Jones
Bedford Road, Clapham
Cost-cutting proposal
Sir - I am always impressed with the logic used by Richard Fuller and Dave Hodgson on how Bedford is a better place by the decisions they make by either investments in the local economy or by cutbacks. I would be delighted if they could answer the following questions by return of post to your fine awardwinning paper.
Tesco seems to be taking over Bedford in a triffid-like fashion. Has our fine local Mayor compared the tax paid by Tesco to the local friendly businesses which they will eventually close? Has Dave done a need analysis on such predictions and is Bedford better off by local businesses or Tesco linked to tax paid to the UK?
I agree totally with our fine Mayor about cutbacks. How much does the Mayor’s office cost per year including all of his staff? Could our fine MP Richard Fuller analyse these figures and calculate whether this expense is worth keeping. I would be interested if Richard could decide if these yearly costs for a non specialised person making specialised decisions are worth it. What are his views about investing these potential savings into local services?
G Percival
Eagle Gardens, Bedford
Act to stop town decline
Sir - I was upset and annoyed, but sadly not surprised, to read the article ‘Ex-Mayor’s £300m vision for town centre scrapped’ (BoS, December 4).
Speaking as someone who was born and raised in Bedford, I have seen nothing but decline in the quality of shopping available to us in the centre over the last 20 years.
I know many people will want to argue with this point but it is a fact.
Unless you want cards, or cheap and cheerful ‘anything’ then the only place to shop seriously is Milton Keynes.
A lot of the big businesses in town are struggling with old, outdated and totally unsuitable premises.
Debenhams and Beales are rabbit warrens.
A lot of big businesses have left the town. Name one store where a serious music or movie collector can go to get something that isn’t ‘chart topping’.
Where are the shops for the larger ladies and men? Where are the shops for the young and trendy like ‘Punkyfish and pulp’ I’m pretty sure Debenhams would love to move to bigger and better premises.
Where are the furniture shops and household electricals? These should all be available in the centre and not just in the retail parks.
The centre desperately needs this redevelopment, even in these uncertain times. It needs the infrastructure there, ready and waiting for when business picks up again, and it will.
Get it in place and offer businesses ‘temporary’ cheaper rents to get them back into the town centre.
If there is more to offer in the centre then the shoppers will return, businesses will want to stay and they will pay the higher rates when the economy gets back on track.
If we don’t act now, Bedford will not be ready and we will once again be struggling to bring both businesses and shoppers back.
Michelle Winter
Cornland, Bedford
New bus station essential
Sir - With no progress on the ambitious Town Centre West development scheme since 2005 due to the wider economy, its formal expiry was inevitable, but it allows us to get on and actually deliver what Bedford deserves – a new bus station and regenerated bus station area.
This has been talked about for decades, but Bedford has had enough of talk. People want to see real regeneration taking place.
That’s why in addition to getting on and making progress on the bus station area, we have a range of exciting regeneration activity taking place.
We have a developer signed up for the Riverside North development, which will see Bedford Town Centre finally making the most of its riverside location with a cinema, new shops, restaurants and more. The Cecil Higgins Art Gallery and Museum is undergoing a £6m redevelopment which will draw visitors to the town, while the High Street will benefit from a £3m heritagebased regeneration scheme.
We are also set to complete the Western Bypass, which will cut congestion and make travelling into Bedford town centre more attractive to visitors. And we will deliver the long-overdue new bus station that Bedford deserves.
All this activity stands Bedford in stark contrast to the many towns struggling with no development taking place in the current climate, and we will continue to keep up the momentum in delivering the regeneration that we all want to see.
Dave Hodgson
Mayor of Bedford
Borough Gypsy site noise row
Sir - How interesting to read your report last week on the site for gypsies being too noisy – ‘Site review after noise report exposed’.
The application for Bletsoe by the A6 was not noisy and Bedford Borough Council officers recommended temporary planning permission for four sites.
Bletsoe, backed by all surrounding villages, fought against this and the planning committee overwhelmingly turned down the application but the travellers, on appeal, won and we have the sites, obviously not too noisy for Bletsoe residents? Who ignored the commissioned report, the council or their officers, one elected by us, the other paid by us?
Concerned gypsy neighbour Colin Deas
Bletsoe
Anger at council’s role
Sir - Following Tuesday’s decision by the Planning Inspector to grant permission for a gypsy and traveller site in Staploe, the real dishonest and double talk by Bedford Borough Council has become more obvious.
It is clear that the council is shedding heaps of crocodile tears as one village after another has a site forced upon them. At the same time, the council is all too pleased that these rural sites are far away from Bedford, and that it is cheaper to let the travellers build these sites themselves rather than have the borough pay for them. There is a site at Meadow Lane that the travellers want to use, which is large enough to ‘house’ all the borough’s needs and leave the rural villages alone. It is extremely disappointing that council officials have made up a bogus sound problem to hide the Mayor’s embarrassment that the council has dithered on preparing the site for use, meaning it can only now be used on a temporary basis.
Sadly, it is villages like Staploe and Bletsoe that have to suffer as a result of such incompetence.
Cllr Tom Wootton
Conservative ward councillor for Wyboston
Protect countryside
Sir - I am increasingly concerned about the Government's planning reforms.
They're right to talk about protecting Green Belts, National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty when decisions are made about where development should take place, but what about the 60 per cent of England's countryside that is none of these things – like a lot of our local countryside? Since 1945, successive governments have protected the countryside for its own sake – which means thinking carefully before building in the countryside, and ensuring it is an option of last resort. For almost 20 years there has been a requirement that land that’s been used before – brownfield land – should be developed before green fields.
The Government is proposing to abandon this policy, yet a new report by the Campaign to Protect Rural England ‘Building in a small island’ demonstrates that the supply of brownfield land is increasing – there is enough to provide 1.5 million new homes. Protecting the countryside and building on brownfield land go hand in hand. Time is running out – I gather that Ministers are considering the final changes to their new planning policies.
If something is not done soon to get them to change their plans, much of our countryside will be at risk. Readers can use the action on the Campaign to Protect Rural England’s website to write to their MP on www.cpre.org.uk
Ann Collett-White
Spring Road, Kempston
