A leading councillor has urged residents to use Spalding’s shops rather than buy online.
Coun Gary Taylor made the plea as South Holland District Council’s Cabinet agreed to release money provided to the Town Board.
“After Covid it’s amazing what people have delivered these days,” he said. “They could go to town centres and support the local shops.
“We still need to encourage people to support those because it’s a case of use it or lose it.
“We’ve seen so much recently about how much pressure the town centres are under.
“It needs to be a partnership approach.
“We can’t change the economy, but we can look at opportunities going forward.”
The first £450,000 released by the government is to include £170,000 for creating the Plan For Neighbourhoods, the Spalding Town Board needs to publish, as well as £70,000 for a regeneration/investment plan.
There is also the £80,000 for the delivery of ‘hot spot policing’ effectively offering paid overtime for patrols in Spalding, which Coun Taylor told the meeting ‘was starting to have some effect’.
Others lamented that the money was not available for their area.
Coun Bryan Alcock said: “It’s great for Spalding but there’s an awful lot of other places that need something similar in the district.”
Coun Worth responded: “If there’s government funds available we can bounce into Crowland, then that would be marvellous, but the reality of it is that the money is there for bigger towns.”
