We’re used to hearing that the UK’s high streets are in decline. With a decade of austerity, the shift to online shopping and the closure of shops during the coronavirus pandemic, high streets certainly face huge challenges.

This session will ask - should we fight to maintain the high street as we have come to know it? Or do we need to replace it with something else that is community owned and has a community function? It will challenge the notion that all UK high streets are fizzling out - finding examples from across the UK of where high streets already offer huge community value.

Hosted by: Ruth Strange from Ethical Consumer

With:

Neil McInroy is CEO of CLES – the UK’s leading independent think and do tank, realising progressive economics for people and place. CLES’s aim is to achieve social justice, good local economies and effective public services. Neil currently focuses on applying a progressive economic model for places, which includes ideas around local wealth building (a people-centred approach to retaining wealth within communities). He has been commissioned by and collaborated with local, regional and national governments and agencies in the UK, Europe, Asia, US and Australasia. He is an Honorary Fellow at the Manchester Urban Institute, University of Manchester, and a Visiting Fellow at Edge Hill University.

Sara Gonzalez is Associate at the School of Geography, University of Leeds. She teaches and carries research on urban issues. She has been researching traditional retail markets and their transformation for ten years. Through publication and public engagement, she has analysed the gentrification of many markets in cities across the UK and internationally and how this can lead to the displacement of customers and traders. Currently she focuses on a project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, understanding the community value that markets generate particularly for vulnerable groups and which is often ignored or neglected. https://trmcommunityvalue.leeds.ac.uk/Twitter: @sgonzalez_sara

Vidhya Alakeson is founding Chief Executive of Power to Change, an independent trust supporting the growth of community businesses across England to create more prosperous and cohesive communities. Vidhya was previously Deputy Chief Executive at the Resolution Foundation, a public policy think tank working on issues affecting low and middle income families. She is a board member of More in Common, an initiative reducing polarisation in developed societies, and trustee of the Young Foundation, developing more connected and sustainable communities across the UK. She advises organisations and the government on the role of community business in regeneration and writes and speaks on community-led development and inclusive growth.

Nicola Round is Co-Founder and Outreach Director at Adfree Cities, a growing network of groups collaborating to resist advertising. Corporate outdoor advertising drives unsustainable consumption, harms our wellbeing and undermines local economies. Adfree Cities supports creative, community-led opposition and alternatives, to make space for what we really need to thrive. www.adfreecities.org.uk

More audio at ethicalconsumer.org

Ethical Consumer Week 2020, explored the role of consumers, businesses, and NGOs in building more resilient communities in the face of Covid-19 and the ecological crisis. We discussed the underlying issues, a radically reimagined future and the actions that we can all take to support just transitions. We gained inspiration from those exploring the answers and already creating ripples of change.

More audio for Ethical Consumer Week at ethicalconsumerweek.com