Painting on a Smile.

by Anna Raccoon on March 11, 2010

This mendacious government is so remarkably adept at ‘not spending money’ on their election campaign.

They fly the Prime Minister out to Afghanistan on a ‘morale boosting trip’, (any soldiers whose morale was boosted by this trip, feel free to e-mail me, I’d be delighted to know you exist)

They spend £540 million a year on marketing and communicating their ideology via TV and print advertising under the guise of’Public Information’.

They cajole celebrities like Piers Morgan into using their prime time television shows to market the allegedly ‘human’ side of the Prime Minister.

They even, bless them for trying, attempted to foist the Prime Minister onto Match of Day to keep him in the public eye, but even the slavishly loyal BBC baulked at having that popular programme cursed by Jonah.

Full marks to them for teasing maximum advantage out of minimum pounds.

But that was Labour Party pounds they were trying to save. Not the fine British pounds in the National Handbag.

Mr Eugenides this morning led me towards a prime example.

It seems North Tyneside has been tasked with finding the solution to the age old problem of recessions – what do you do when all the boarded up shops outnumber the businesses that are clinging on and start to act as a deterrent to visiting that shopping centre?

Back in 1966, or maybe 1965, The Elephant and Castle shopping centre was built and quickly became known as the ‘White Elephant’. Times were hard and only a 10^th of the shop units were occupied. It wasn’t an inviting place to go, lighting was kept at a minimum to contain costs, so you groped your way past boarded up shop fronts to Woolworths and Spud’s are Us, which from memory were just about the only people managing to pay both rates and rent and remain open.

Privately owned, the management had to do something that didn’t involve tax payers money, for the simple reason that they didn’t have any access to tax payers money. They were also liable for the rates even on empty properties. They came up with a novel idea.

‘Tell you what’, they said, ‘anyone who is prepared to stock a shop and pay the rates, no rent, on the strict undertaking that if we manage to find a paying tenant they vacate the shop in one month without question, can have one – free’.

Guess who elbowed her way to the front of the queue?

Which is how I came to have a magnificent 60 x 60 brand new shop in which to settle yet another of my capitalist money making ideas – this time it was, if memory serves me right, buying old pine chairs down Bermondsey market for 10 shillings each, painting them in day glo colours, adding a few squiggles and dots in other day glo colours, and remarketing them as just the thing at £5 each for the household that couldn’t quite afford the Habitat originals…..

I know, sacrilege, and years later those chairs all re-emerged on the market stinking of caustic and were re-sold as genuine Victorian pine chairs by the glut of pine shops on the King’s Road. They probably cursed my dots and squiggles as they sanded them out – at least half the paint was anti-barnacle marine paint bought in a job lot and tinted with left over stain from my candle making debacle – I managed to blow out three of the windows in my rented flat, and leave a fine rose garden dripping in candle wax, but I digress as usual.

The point being, that at no cost to anyone, that shopping centre was filled within a couple of weeks with dozens of fledgling and colourful businesses earning their proprietors an honest living, and all dutifully paying the rates and thankful for our good fortune. The centre thrives to this day.

Compare that to North Tyneside’s solution.

With 140 empty shops in the borough, council bosses think they have come up with a unique way of ensuring shopping areas remain as vibrant as possible.

The first empty shop unit to be given a makeover with a “flat pack” shop front is in Whitley Bay.

“This is a simple and cost-effective approach that keeps the retail unit available for potential new uses and in the meantime also contributes to the street scene.”

Empty shops in Wallsend and North Shields are now being earmarked for similar treatment, which costs about £1,500 a time.

The government-funded project involves colourful graphic designs featuring a range of different shop types, which are either taped inside the windows or screwed to the fascia so they can be removed and reused as required.

So, nobody is paying any rates. Nobody is being given an opportunity to set up a low cost business and get off the dole AND it’s costing the ratepayer £1,500 a throw.

Does anybody know which relative of a Labour councillor holds the contract for doing this work?

Mr Eugenides describes it as the ‘Potemkin Village’ solution. Perfect, I couldn’t have put it better myself.

{ 16 comments }

1 Specky March 11, 2010 at 14:16

Yes being a local authority there is bound to be the usuall brand of corrupt nepotism at work.
As for Broon on MOTD get your mitts of MOTD, fat boy.

2 miss mink March 11, 2010 at 14:36

And the money grab goes on . . . . .
God forbid we encourage and help small entrepreneur’s . . . .
How is this going to help Brown’s favourite mantra,
‘strong economic growth’ ?

3 Demetrius March 11, 2010 at 14:59

Down south we have something called “Bluewater” which comes to the same thing. A fascinating place it is very difficult to get in then often impossible to get out, we have never tried we just gawp at the traffic reports. This way this one works is to increase economic growth by persuading untold numbers of people to drive great distances using up vast quantities of fuel. They then buy a load of useless tat that they could have got at half the price locally if it were not for the fact that local shops have closed because of taxation. Said tat is largely imported affecting the balance of payments and government borrowing that also increases the GDP.

4 Fabian the Fabulous March 11, 2010 at 15:02

Have I got this right? They’re going to stick a picture of a shop front onto the front of a shop – and it’s going to cost

5 backwoodsman March 11, 2010 at 15:48

All Hands on Deck !
Please take the time to fill in the form inviting the beeboids to reform themselves, and send it to the bbc trust.
http://www.38degrees.org.uk/email-the-BBC-Trust

6 Antisthenes March 11, 2010 at 19:34

I have not got much to say on your article except it is brilliant. I have just found your site and I will follow it with avid interest, assuming the trillions of other who already do don’t swamp your server again.

7 SadButMadLad March 11, 2010 at 21:02

When I first heard about this story a week or so back I thought it was a good idea in that it helped change the “street scene” and stopped it looking a very depressing place. However the more I thought about it, the more I thought it actually did very little. The problem is that it is soo fake and only fixes a small problem as the town centre will still look depressing if they don’t keep up the maintenance of everything else which costs even more. Then I hear about your story and realise that the councillors have done the ususal thing and wasted, sorry spent, someone else money, namely tax payers money. When politicians take personal responsibility for the money they spend on our behalf then they might come up with some better ideas.

8 Alan March 11, 2010 at 23:00

Shop-jacketing

North Tyneside Council have been bunged

9 John Pickworth March 12, 2010 at 01:34

I don’t believe it Anna.

Admit it. You were faced with an empty article and decided to paper over the blank space with this fake story instead?

10 sconzey March 12, 2010 at 02:08

I need to read your blog more often.

11 Brian March 12, 2010 at 02:19

Alas, in this socialist paradise called Airstrip One, any attempt to repeat the sixties’ Elephant and Castle (a little bit of Coventry in London I always thought when I worked in that bit of the smoke) experiment would result in many empty shops being taken over by extremist Islamofascist bookshops selling beheading videos etc because artisan furniture painters would not be able to afford the health and safety papertrail required for their products. Besides, big government prefers to work through big business and retail chains proliferate thus creating clone towns.

12 Blink March 12, 2010 at 08:28

There’s a place for us,
Somewhere a place for us.
Peace and quiet and open air
Wait for us
Somewhere.

There’s a time for us,
Some day a time for us,
Time together with time spare,
Time to learn, time to care,
Some day!

Somewhere.
We’ll find a new way of living,
We’ll find a way of forgiving
Somewhere . . .

There’s a place for us,
A time and place for us.
Hold my hand and we’re halfway there.
Hold my hand and I’ll take you there
Somehow,
Some day,
Somewhere!

BUT IT AIN’T HERE

13 opinion prole March 12, 2010 at 10:22

Brilliant concept which could be extended to so many areas of life in broken Britain.
No manufacturing left in the Midlands? Gaze upon this huge photo of a modern car plant projected onto the side of Fort Dunlop.
Trains not arriving on time? Kindly observe this life size photo of a Japanese bullet train.
Dying of dehydration in an NHS ward? Never fear, focus on this photo of Evian water in a squeaky clean French hospital.
Police not responding to a burglary? Refer to this shot of armed feds bringing down a suspected felon in downtown Chicago.
No money in the Bank of England when the IMF comes to call? No problem, huge full colour depiction of a pile of gold bars.
No competent person available in the whole of the Labour party to run the government? Easy peasy, look out for the 3D hologram of New Zealand, Swiss, French (insert nationality of competent politician) ministers outside No 10!