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23 Apr 2024

This May, join the movement to create safer, more bike-friendly streets with the Bike Month Challenge and #MakeEveryRideCount!

23 Apr 2024

The number of reported e-bike thefts doubled in the space of a year in the UK, with a 103% increase in 2023 compared to 2022, according to a study by Evolve E-bikes. While the...

22 Apr 2024

Small shops have been more "agile" at fighting COVID sale slumps than chain stores, according to a new report.

22 Apr 2024

For the first time in its campaign to help the city address escalating lithium-ion battery fires, the Fire Department of New York filed criminal charges against a Brooklyn e-bike shop owner for...

22 Apr 2024

The managing director of Brompton has backed a campaign to introduce stricter e-bike battery regulations in the UK, amid "too many examples of e-bikes, e-scooters and light electric...

15 Apr 2024

The Rediscovery Centre, the National Centre for the Circular Economy in Ireland, today announced its partnership with Cytech, the internationally recognised training and accreditation scheme for...

12 Apr 2024

Just two weeks remain for the UK cycle industry to have its say on the current Government consultation to double the permissible power of e-bikes, and to remove the need for pedalling.

10 Apr 2024

Award-winning cycling business Spokes Bikes has added a new shop in Greenock to existing shop in Bridge of Weir.

9 Apr 2024

Communities across England are to be given access to £101 million of government funding for high-quality walking and cycling routes, improving the quality of local public engagement for...

9 Apr 2024

The founders of a Wirral bike recycling scheme have opened a hub across the River Mersey as part of a campaign to encourage more people into cycling.

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Mary Portas warns government to act now or see half of high street shops shut

Posted on in Business News , Cycles News

Ahead of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement this week, retail expert Mary Portas called on the Government to rethink business rates and VAT to help struggling retailers.

She said: “Put simply we could lose half of all shops. We need to look at the systems they are currently working under, because they are not fit for purpose for the future.

Row of Bikes

“So VAT, business rates, all of it needs to be looked at. We need to look at the bigger picture and how people want, and need to live, in the future – for the good of themselves and the planet.”

In 2011, she published a report stating the aim was to “put the heart back into the centre of our high streets, calling on the authorities to re-imagine them “as destinations for socialising, culture, health, wellbeing, creativity and learning.” But she says nothing has changed in the past decade and without more support thousands of small shops will be lost during the cost-of-living crisis.

“It’s no different now to 11 years ago when I brought out my report,” she says. “As for big business and governments, people don’t trust them, they’ve had enough. We want what’s local, what’s safe and what we can trust.”

She added: “What’s inspiring, but at the same time frustrating, is everything I wrote in my report more than a decade ago, about how important high streets are to our society and our daily lives, is the same.

“They’re more important than what is being sold to us. People, particularly post-Covid, realise how important they are to their wellbeing and how they live. Having thriving high streets we can walk or cycle to for our daily needs is vital to our future.”

She praised “incredible independents” which make up 90% of high street businesses but admitted frustration because “all we talk about are big businesses”.

She said: “Small businesses have been hugely successful, and we need them to succeed. When it comes to budgets and government spending, I believe it needs to be about prioritising. And I happen to think we should prioritise the wellbeing of society.”

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