Contribution
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Lewell. I thank the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) for securing this debate. Many in my constituency will welcome the comments by my hon. Friends the Members for Bolton West (Phil Brickell) and for Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes (Melanie Onn), given the kind of shops that we have in Bexleyheath and Crayford and the changes we have seen in recent years.
I declare an interest: I am a member of the USDAW parliamentary group. I spent 11 years working in retail. I started as a Saturday boy—an old-fashioned term, I know—in my Marks & Spencer in Bexleyheath, and I worked my way up to a management role, so I understand the importance of high street businesses to our communities.
In my constituency, we have two town centres in the two towns, with a mix of large retailers and independent stores, a smaller high street in Northumberland Heath and a number of smaller shopping parades. I appreciate that, in the 32 years since I first worked in retail, our town centres have changed, and that has been heavily driven by changes in our shopping habits.
In my constituency, with a retail park in Crayford and a 1980s shopping centre in Bexleyheath, we have lost some of our high street shops from the shopping centre, which has a higher footfall, because of the pattern of businesses, particularly my former employer, that want to be in those retail parks. I know from the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler) that my former employer has recently invested in its store in his constituency—in fact, in a number of stores in London—but with a very defined model, which is very different from when I first worked for it 32 years ago. It is about food retail rather than clothing, and it is about retail parks. That is the reality of where some of our high street businesses have gone; we cannot replicate the high street of the 20th century.
There are some issues unique to my constituency. I thank my local business improvement district and Broadway shopping centre in Bexleyheath for the work they do to diversify opportunity and to try to bring leisure opportunities into the town centre. I hope there is some good news coming, with a new retailer in the near future. I receive requests, notably from the Kings Arms, Globetrotters soft play, Masala Inn, Zingara, Stuzzichini and Buddha restaurant in Bexleyheath, and the Duke’s Head, and the Duchess of Kent in Northumberland Heath, about the pressures on the hospitality industry. I thank you, Ms Lewell, for the work you do leading on those issues.
I support the Government’s Great British summer savings, which I hope will increase footfall for a number of those businesses. I note that Government changes have meant that two thirds of the pubs in my constituency have seen their business rates go down this year, but there is more we need to do and, while any measure would need to be costed, I am receptive to looking at the rate of VAT in the hospitality industry.
On cash, there are no longer any banks in Crayford and Northumberland Heath. We rely on post offices in those two places for cash services. We need to look further at the criteria for banking hubs and make sure there are more of them.
I welcome the Government’s announcements on the high streets strategy. I engaged with the previous Minister and I look forward to engaging with the new Minister to look at more investment in my patch. On Pride in Place, we are seeing £20 million coming into Slade Green; the retailers in Forest Road and Slade Green will look forward to that investment.
On transport, I continue to press Transport for London for a direct bus route between Crayford and Northumberland Heath to support the shopping parades, and to press my Conservative council to introduce a fairer short-stay parking arrangement for traders in Northumberland Heath.
I welcome measures in the Crime and Policing Act 2026. I have been at the forefront—I have wrestled shoplifters to the floor, many times—and I welcome the measures that the Government have brought forward, but there is still much more that we need to do to support people, and I will continue to press for that.
My policing teams have done some great work in Crayford around illegal working, particularly with delivery drivers in my retail park, with arrests and deportations as a result. I thank my policing team in Crayford for that. They have also worked on shoplifting there. In Bexleyheath, they have done similar work; I went out on a raid with them last summer and looked at the work they do. They have also done some great work on illegal shops, which hon. Members have commented on, but they still need an increase in police numbers.
I have welcomed the changes that have been brought forward. Police in Bexleyheath now have higher police numbers at the end of the day and at school kicking-out time, and on a Friday and Saturday night. That is as a result of changes that were controversial, but which I have supported.
There is more that the Government could do to support our high streets and businesses. I will continue to press them on that, but, as I have said, I support them on a number of the things that have already been done.