Last week our newest member of the Councillor team in Marshalswick South, Rod Perks, made his maiden speech in full council. Using his professional knowledge and experience to support the work of the council in supporting our local economy Rod made a positive contribution to the debate.
This was in response to a Tory motion which helped to highlight both their own historical lack of interest in what the council has been trying to do to improve St Albans, and also the desire for more talk, with no suggestions for real action.
Other contributors highlighted the results of recent surveys that showed St Albans as the second –most resilient economy in coping with the current Recession.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11233799

Let us all trust that a `double-dip` in the UK/Global economy will not test that resilience further !!

The text of the speech is below:
“By happy coincidence it does at least concern a topic about which I have a fair amount of experience having brought my family to live in St Albans in 1972 – and for thirty of those years I was the Principal of a Commercial Property Agency business that was based in the City centre.

In response to this Motion I think I can reassure Members in any event that the LibDem side of this Chamber keeps a careful eye on all economic pointers – as some of the following data may demonstrate.
Incidentally I am indebted to the various Officers of the Council for this data – who were very much `on the ball` and had this information readily at their fingertips.
Now that we are 3 years into the deepest economic downturn any of us have ever witnessed I think it is a testament to the good sense of Landlords – and the energy & enterprise of Tenants – that so few shops are empty in the City centre (a vacancy rate in Sept. 2010 of 5.6% against the National figure of 12.4%).

Latest data shows that pedestrian footfall in the City Centre generally increased July 2009 – July 2010 by 7.3%
From February this year to July the figures increased by 10.8%.
Although the measures for Catherine Street are static the footfall increase for the north end of St Peters Street it is more than double that for the Street as a whole.

As for the Market I am advised that in the stretch from Poundworld up to Catherine Street there are 29 stalls.
On Wednesdays 21 of these pitches are ‘permanently’ occupied.
On Saturdays 23 are booked out to ‘permanent’ Traders.
The Markets Dept advise me that this situation has remained unchanged for probably at least 4 years and in fact one of the Saturday pitches is now held in the second generation of the same family.

This would seem to indicate that if the right sort of goods or services are being supplied then a viable business can be maintained – despite the deepest of recessions.

NCP also tell me that from their internal data for Russell Avenue / Drovers Way MSCPs for the period February 2010 – September 2010 the average peak occupancy figures ranged between 61.02 and 75.61%.
Even at midday on the busiest Saturday there was at least 10% unused capacity.
Therefore if shoppers or others are being attracted to the City Centre then there are plenty of spaces in which they can park.

Full Council probably not the best forum for us to debate the future of High Streets and Retail Diversity. There are already many good people across the UK engaged in trying to solve this puzzle.
However whilst we should continue to be on our guard against any risk of complacency, sadly there is nothing sufficiently novel in this Motion that commends itself for my support.”

After considerable debate the Motion was lost as it failed to recognise that work had been going on for some time in St Albans, or that other parts of the district also need our support.