Struggling market is no thanks to Debenhams

We know they don’t listen; we’ve become used to that.

Sadly, they don’t seem to try to make amends when they have clearly got things wrong.

‘Debenhams is coming. hoorah’ they said. ‘It’ll be the making of the town’.

But Debenhams didn’t want market stalls in the town centre – they felt it lowered the tone round the entrance to County Square.

Not, of course, that that was where the stalls were clustered.

The council kowtowed to Debenhams and decided to move the stalls to the Lower High Street for a year’s trial, where everyone knew they would lose business.

A council statement said this would enliven the area and benefit the businesses there. A petition was raised to keep the market in the town centre - the obvious and only sensible place for it to be - and some 600 people signed it.

Those of us who live in Ashford are at a severe disadvantage when it comes to council decisions. The councillors or council officers coming from cosy villages scattered through a vast area have no idea of what the town actually needs.

Indeed, we sometimes get the impression that the town is an embarrassment to them – a blot on the idyllic Kent countryside.

They voted for the dismal Portas Pilot scheme and a regular, monthly ‘Farmers’ Market’. This, too was shunted down to the lower High Street and – surprise, surprise – it folded up and went home. I may be wrong but I seem to remember that the council gave considerable help to the Farmers’ Market.

Were they to give the same help they gave to the failed monthly market, showing that they are proud of the town’s centuries-long reputation, as a market town, things would be markedly different.

Sadly, such a sensible move would not give council officers the joy and kudos of indulging in multi-million pound ventures.

It has been suggested that a move to the town centre could have a deleterious effect on the occasional bandstand events. This is rubbish.

‘We sometimes get the impression that the town is an embarrassment’