For those who missed the debate between Halesowen & Rowley Regis MP Sylvia Heal and James Morris the Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate on BBC WM’s Ed Doolan show on February 15, one of the topics was the lack of footfall on Cradley Heath High Street.

It is widely recognised that Cradley Heath was always one of the most popular market towns in the Black Country.

James Morris commented the traders he had spoken to on the High Street thought business had declined since Tesco came to the town and they also stressed Sandwell Council had since neglected the town centre.

Sylvia Heal appeared to defend the Labour controlled council and disagreed with this opinion by claiming other local towns such as Blackheath, with Sainsbury’s, and Halesowen, with ASDA, were both thriving and that Cradley Heath was no different, suggesting that ‘the traders sometimes needed to help themselves’.

Not the most supportive comment from our elected parliamentary representative!

I personally think that’s a very unhelpful statement and I would assume she has been a career politician and probably never run her own business, especially through a recession.

If Sylvia Heal were to visit Cradley Heath and speak to the traders she will discover they’re not as happy as she might think.

When Tesco first came to Cradley Heath many promises were made to the traders by Sandwell Council and to this day they have quite simply not been met.

Original recommendations suggested the store should be one third smaller so as not to impact too greatly on the rest of the town. However the council then chose to approve plans for a ‘superstore’ that well exceeded those recommendations.

The old town car park that was swallowed up by the Tesco development was to remain a shoppers’ car park for the benefit of Tesco and the rest of the town and yet if you stay longer than three hours you are likely to be fined.

Sandwell Council also agreed to have signs directing shoppers to the town centre markets and to re-instate the town’s toilets, which were demolished to make way for the by-pass, but neither of these have ever materialised.

There is no denying Tesco has brought an enormous amount of people to Cradley Heath, which is very welcome, but due to the lack of foresight from the Council with regard to the store’s accessibility and integration into the town, the High Street is not reaping the benefits. Listening to the comments made by Sylvia Heal you would think retailing and manufacturing are both booming at the moment.

I think she appears to be out of touch with what is really happening in the business world in her constituency and in particular in Cradley Heath. Alan Bowler, Cradley Heath