‘Businesses like ours are going to die and your society is going to change’
CALLS for office staff to work from home threaten the future of independent businesses, Birmingham city centre traders claim.
Already reeling from 20 months of restrictions and disruption caused by Covid, traders were hoping for a pre-Christmas boost before the quieter months of January and February.
Leigh Paton has been selling baked potatoes from her Mr Bumbles trailer in Cherry Street for 31 years.
But with footfall dwindling she said it had been a “very tough” 18 months trying to keep her business afloat.
Mrs Paton said: “If I were the government, I would be saying take what precautions you can, look after the vulnerable and protect them. But after that it’s your risk, go out and live your life.
“Because otherwise, businesses like ours are going to die and your society is going to change.
“If people are working from home, we won’t have their custom here.
“For retail, for food and for hospi- tality, it’s just going to have a devastating effect. We need a vibrant, lively, busy city centre. This government edict is just going to kill us all off. It’s been a really hard 18 months and this isn’t going to help.
“The truth is, that because we are here a lot of people think we are doing OK. What they are forgetting is us, the pubs, the clubs, lots of other food places and retail even... we might be open, but we’re not making any profit.
Tara Gahir, who runs Mr Simms Sweet Shop, in the Great Western Arcade, said: “This side of the city centre has been hit so hard.
“This is predominantly a business area and we were finally thinking that things were picking up.
“The Clean Air Zone kicked in too this year.
All of this is going to kill the city centre.
“Business-wise, ‘work from home’ is going to be the nail in the coffin I feel – December can be 30 per cent of our revenue for the whole year.
“I was really disheartened when I heard the news and scared, because who is going to bail us out this time?
“We’ve got business rates kicking back in at 50 per cent, we’re going to have landlords asking us for backdated rents soon.
“A business like ours that is customer based is predominantly office staff.
“It’s going to horrendous for us and I’m really scared and have a real negative impact on my business.
“We’ve probably only got 25 per cent of people coming back in and now we’ll be losing that as well.”
Ben Johnson is part of the family running the city’s oldest independent jewellery retailer Rex Johnson & Son in Corporation Street.
As well as the impact of Covid restrictions, the shop has suffered more than three months of disruption after the Metro line outside was dug up and replaced.
Mr Johnson was philosophical about the ‘work from home’ policy because the new changes had not targeted whole industries like hospitality.
“It’s far from ideal and I can’t say it wasn’t unexpected,” he said. “But what pleased us about the announcement is that it wasn’t lockdowns on industries again.
“If they had closed hospitality, I think that would have been a real blow for retailers.
“This should be our busiest time of the year and we’ve got two weeks until Christmas.
“We just hope that customers with the right restrictions still come and have confidence to come into the city to shop.”