The demise of Wilkinson – or Wilko as it has come to be affectionately known – is emblematic of the decline of Britain’s high streets.
That a store where you could buy almost anything – from pick and mix to picture hooks – should now be closing down speaks to both our addiction to Amazon and the increasing inaccessibility of our town centres.
It’s not just that high streets are no longer great places to shop any more because of the closure of major department stores like Debenhams.
It’s also a fact of modern life that it is nigh on impossible to pop in and out of a local high street with the same ease that you can order something online, or visit an out-of-town retail park.
The problem undoubtedly got worse during the pandemic, which, as well as starving stores like Wilko of footfall, prompted a number of (largely Left-wing) councils to indiscriminately close roads in the interests of creating some sort of misplaced post-Covid “cafe culture”.
St Albans, where I went to school, has suffered considerably from such idiotic and seemingly arbitrary decision-making. Its historic, 1,100-year-old weekly market has been significantly scaled back, while a main thoroughfare through the town is now shut at weekends, to the detriment of local businesses.
This picture is repeated the length and breadth of Britain, where the closure of more than 5,000 bank and building society branches since January 2015 has compounded what is fast becoming an existential crisis for our high streets.
A lot of these supposedly well meaning local authorities bang on about the importance of “community”, “diversity” and “inclusion” without seemingly realising that most people derive a sense of belonging from their town, village and city centres – not empty slogans, virtue-signalling flags or other meaningless initiatives masquerading as progress.
For there is nothing remotely forward thinking about boarded up shops and failed local economies.
The demise of Wilkinson – or Wilko as it has come to be affectionately known – is emblematic of the decline of Britain’s high streets.
That a store where you could buy almost anything – from pick and mix to picture hooks – should now be closing down speaks to both our addiction to Amazon and the increasing inaccessibility of our town centres.
It’s not just that high streets are no longer great places to shop any more because of the closure of major department stores like Debenhams.
It’s also a fact of modern life that it is nigh on impossible to pop in and out of a local high street with the same ease that you can order something online, or visit an out-of-town retail park.
The problem undoubtedly got worse during the pandemic, which, as well as starving stores like Wilko of footfall, prompted a number of (largely Left-wing) councils to indiscriminately close roads in the interests of creating some sort of misplaced post-Covid “cafe culture”.
St Albans, where I went to school, has suffered considerably from such idiotic and seemingly arbitrary decision-making. Its historic, 1,100-year-old weekly market has been significantly scaled back, while a main thoroughfare through the town is now shut at weekends, to the detriment of local businesses.
This picture is repeated the length and breadth of Britain, where the closure of more than 5,000 bank and building society branches since January 2015 has compounded what is fast becoming an existential crisis for our high streets.
A lot of these supposedly well meaning local authorities bang on about the importance of “community”, “diversity” and “inclusion” without seemingly realising that most people derive a sense of belonging from their town, village and city centres – not empty slogans, virtue-signalling flags or other meaningless initiatives masquerading as progress.
For there is nothing remotely forward thinking about boarded up shops and failed local economies.