Unfortunatly,we've gone from a nation of shopkeepers to a nation of "I wabt it now and I want it cheap and never mind the quality" shoppers.
Margaret Thatcher wanted to de-nationalise everything and see a competetive business nation.
As a result,it became easy for the bigger more successful businesses to swallow up the smaller competitors,until you have the situation that we are in now.
But also bear in mind that the likes of Virgin and HMV came along and pretty much killed off the smaller independent music shops.What goes around,comes around.
As has been said,the next big challenge will be to change the attitude of the next generation who will find ways of downloading from the net illegally and think nothing of it,therefore probably killing off the music industry as we know it and leaving it to musicians to produce and sell thier music only at gigs.Where I live,we are lucky in the fact that most of the shops are privately owned and the number of "chains" are relativley few...Boots,Edinburgh Woolen Mill,M&Co and the Co-operative are about the only ones(apart from banks and building societies) that I can think of.
If they are pressed enough,the local politicians can excert pressure on the government to do something if there are enough of the population that want it to change....but does it?
As a nation,there's a generation now(mine) that have grown up with wanting better and have used to getting what they want at any time.In a sense,we've become spoiled and it's only now that were coming to realise that we have had it too good.The items you buy for 12p are cheap for a reason...the horsemeat scandal,is just one of the stories that made the headlines,but do you stop and think about how a supermarket can charge so little for something when you consider what goes into it (or what doesn't) that makes it so cheap?
I for one would prefer to go to my local butcher and spend a bit more but I know that the meat will be local and of good quality.
This,I think is the way forward for high streets...a complete reworking of the business rates system and smaller,independant and more importantly more high quality food suppliers.Butchers,bakers and candlestickmakers.
Bloody hell,I'm off for a lie down!
