Edmonton, I love you

Times are tough. I'm sure you don't need me to remind you that. Pretty much everyone is feeling the pinch and the victims of the economic downturn are plentiful. With even big businesses going bust, it's understandable that local shops on our very own high streets are also struggling to keep their heads above water.

Enfield Council and the Enfield Business and Retailers Association know this only too well. So, to boost trade locally in the face of flagging sales and a negative image of the area in the wake of the summer riots, they have taken action and come up with the 'Love Your High Street' campaign.

Last Friday I went along to Enfield Town with the borough's two other MPs, David Burrowes and Nick de Bois, to add a little bit of our own love to our local high streets and to emphasise what a diverse and personal service a lot of our shops have to offer (definitely more intimate and rewarding than a few clicks on Amazon).

We can all, most definitely, do our bit to help keep our shopping areas healthy simply by using the services that are on offer to us on our doorstep. But the Government has a role to play too and hiking VAT and failing to give local communities a real say in developing a plan for their shops, nor following through with Labour's empty shop initiative, has only exacerbated the problems local businesses are facing.

Some figures I received over the summer revealed that there is a 23.3% shop vacancy rate in Lower Edmonton. That means nearly one in every four shops is lying empty, up 2.5% on the previous year and comparing very unfavourably with the national average of around 15%. We simply cannot afford for the number of vacancies to go up any further, so we need to let the remaining shops know that we'd like them to stick around, not just for Christmas so we can buy a few last minute presents, but for the foreseeable future.

So while I work on getting David Cameron and his pals to be a little more loving and giving, why don't you have a go at telling your local high street, through your actions, those three very special words.