Here, the General Election candidates for the North West Cambridgeshire constituency give their views on the decline of our high streets and what can be done to revitalise them.
Sam Carling (Labour)
"Visible decline in our high streets is a symptom of an economy that no longer works for small businesses.
"Labour would replace the business rates system and level the playing field between the high street and online giants, as well as better incentivising investment, tackling empty properties, and supporting fresh entrepreneurship.
"We are fully behind small businesses – we’ll take action on late payments, which cause huge damage to businesses and self-employed people, and we’ll remove barriers to exporting for small businesses as well as giving them greater access to government contracts by reforming procurement rules.
"We’ll also tackle the broader societal challenges that are holding high street businesses back - like antisocial behaviour, which we’ll specifically target through the introduction of new town centre police patrols.
"And we’ll support small businesses to train and develop staff, by putting employers at the heart of our skills system. Under the Conservatives, apprenticeship numbers have plummeted and skill shortages are widespread, holding back our economy.
"Labour would create a flexible Growth and Skills Levy to replace the Conservatives’ broken Apprenticeships Levy – which would enable small businesses to build apprenticeships more easily and improve their access to training and development for staff, facilitating growth."
James Sidlow (Reform UK)
"The traditional British high street has been struggling for a long time - overwhelmed by large multinational corporations - but small businesses are making great efforts to revive our high streets, enriching our communities, and and we need to support them.
"Reform UK has a plan to support local businesses. We want to reduce the paperwork and tax burden on small and medium sized businesses, increasing the thresholds for VAT and corporation tax. This will encourage existing local businesses to grow and incentivise entrepreneurship.
"Reform will lower fuel duty and energy costs to reduce goods and transport costs.
"Local businesses will have more money to invest and ordinary people more money in their pocket to spend locally. This, assisted by increasing the 20% tax threshold to £20,000, would increase people’s capacity to shop where they prefer, not where they can afford.
"If I were elected I would push to deliver these policies in Westminster, to support our nation’s high streets."
Bridget Smith (Liberal Democrats)
"This is not a problem that can be easily fixed by dropping rents and rates. Our high streets need to evolve into something fit for the modern age.
"If we leave the market to sort this problem, we will find our town centres hollowed out with no vibrancy and full of gambling centres, betting shops and barber shops.
"Government needs to engage with individual councils to find a new template for town centres that restores footfall and makes them destinations again.
"There needs to be a programme of events throughout the year to help encourage a more vibrant atmosphere, by having regular farmers’ markets, craft fayres and other events, such as food festivals and historic events.
"Small independent retailers should be encouraged to set up in vacant premises to provide interest and a better alternative to online retail offerings. Also retailers need to adapt to the new trading conditions.
"Government can also do its bit by restoring our economy so that people have a reduced burden in terms of the cost of living and have more available cash to spend in our high streets."
Elliot Tong (Green Party)
"Sadly, the businesses that are relied upon for these essentials have been struggling due to the decline of our economy over the last twenty years.
"Shops are closing left and right, negatively impacting many people, but especially those that are unable to order important things such as food online - for example, some older people that are less familiar with computers.
"The Green Party recognises the importance of the high street, pledging its support for small and medium-sized businesses. On top of this, we understand the strengths of community-owned enterprises and seek to stick up for them in order to encourage the creation of organisations run by the community for the community.
"We fight to establish a series of regional mutual banks that will revitalise local economies while helping businesses to be more environmentally friendly, funding this through the United Kingdom Infrastructure Bank alongside an extra £10 billion.
"We also aim to provide local authorities with £2 billion every year to further help businesses as our country moves towards net-zero carbon emissions."
Shailesh Vara (Conservative)
"It is vital that we do all that we can to maintain the small shops and businesses that form the cornerstones of our communities and provide employment and opportunity for so many.
"In my many meetings with local businesses, it has been made clear that they recognise the benefits and appeal of online shopping but are keen to maintain personal contact with consumers, which can often be a form of socialisation for many.
"Having a rejuvenated high street also creates more jobs, by giving people the opportunity to work locally as part of the local community and to help provide for those who live nearby.
"Since 2019, there has been over £15 billion invested into levelling-up across the UK, £4.8 billion of which is being used to revitalise and transform town centres and high streets.
"These funds have been welcomed by small businesses and town councils, but we must go further and continue investing with levelling-up plans which will ensure that the future of our high street is safe."
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