Letter: Boarded-up shop spoiling Bridgnorth High Street & a charabanc outing – picture throwback

My dismay at empty shop unit

When I was driving down Bridgnorth High Street I couldn't believe my old shop Gadsbys jewellers was still boarded up after years of being empty. 

Surely Bridgnorth District Council could put pressure on the owners to repair and re-let the property. 

It used to be a smart busy retail outlet.

But now it is just a blot on the High Street, and is spoiling the look of this lovely market town.

Simon Green, Stourbridge

Support retail with new tax

As the obscenely large rise in the business rating system comes into effect in addition to the NI increase, laying waste to our pubs, restaurants and high street shops, it’s time for a radical revamp of our taxation system if our towns and cities are to remain vibrant retail centres.

A new form of taxation is desperately needed.

It should be aimed solely at the online retail and service providers who have reaped the immense benefits of centralized trading at the expense of traditional businesses.An online transaction tax, to include banking and financial services and utilising the undoubted power of Artificial Intelligence, would rapidly raise the funds required to abolish or at least, severely reduce the rating and NI burden on local service providers that are central to the success and ambience of our towns and villages.

Losing our pubs, restaurants and local shops can be counted in lost jobs, social isolation and life impairment.

Politicians need to act now.

Peter Morgan, Audlem

Concentrate on finding water

There is a job's future in creating manufacturers for space exploration, though couldn't an even more exciting, satisfying future lie in locating water sources in poor countries to produce pumps and the pipes?  At least 800 million people, especially in Africa and India, rely on shrinking water supplies due to climate changes, and often contaminated too.

Renewed focus on space along with aid cuts, drying up opportunities for so many people, it’s the home planet which badly needs priority. No new reservoirs for 30 years means engineering opportunities for our own country too.

Chris Seed, Midlands

Irony of Trump

How ironic that Donald Trump is removing immigrants. His father was an immigrant, as was his grandfather. And his wife and Scottish mother.

Valerie Amos, Muxton

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