Portsmouth News

Candidates discuss how to rejuvenate city centre

Bold and creative thinking has been called for to bring about a regenerati­on in Commercial Road, as Portsmouth South candidates told of how they would improve the city’s high streets.

During a hustings event hosted by Portsmouth High School, candidates were quizzed on the health of the city’s shopping areas.

Labour candidate Stephen Morgan said he’s “ashamed” of Commercial

Road, where the former Debenhams store has been derelict since March 2020. He added that Portsmouth should see the investment that “it rightly deserves” and stressed he wants to return “anchor stores” to high streets to attract other retailers. Conservati­ve candidate Signe Biddle criticised Portsmouth City Council, saying high streets “are looking fairly poor, the local council is directly involved in that – you should be asking your Lib Dem council what they’ll do about it”. She highlighte­d the government’s Levelling Up scheme, which provides £5.6bn for high streets “across the country”.

Liberal Democrat candidate Charlie Murphy emphasised the broader national issues affecting high streets.

He added that we have to regenerate town centres by “being creative on how we’re using them and responding to the changing times”.

Reform UK candidate Mark Zimmer reminisced about the past vibrancy of

Portsmouth’s high streets. He described them as the “hubs of the community”, which is important to people’s “sense of belonging”.

Green Party candidate Elliott Lee called for local community involvemen­t in budget decisions. “I’m a proponent of participat­ory budgeting, where the local community actually has a say in how we spend a local budget – that way they can have a say in what they want in their community.”

Jacob Short of the Portsmouth Independen­t Party said: “The big issue is business rates are too high, so small local businesses struggle. I would push for lower business rates to ensure our local business owners don’t just have a place for footfall – but they have support from the local government and their MP.”

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The old Debenhams site has been derelict for four years