I WAS interested to read your recent letter about the empty shops in Darwen town centre. I was even more interested to see the total lack of concern from anyone about the problem.

No wonder Darwen's centre is so dismal. The Council are only interested in Blackburn and even the local traders seem riddled with apathy. Perhaps they don't want any more shops to take what little business they must be generating.

At a glance it might seem that the centre isn't that bad. But take a closer look. A lot of the shops are what I call service outlets. They don't actually sell anything; they just provide a service - cleaners, bookies, banks (not that you can get much service there other than a suggestion to call into their Blackburn branch), video rental and so on.

Has anyone in Darwen been over to Chorley recently? The population is probably half as much again. But the number of retail outlets and big stores is amazing.

I know Blackburn Council (I hesitate to add with Darwen as that is merely a sop) owns some of the closed shops. Why not let them cheaply? And not to sell bric-a-brac or second-hand clothes.

Darwen town centre is, frankly, a disgrace. Instead of one or two hot heads shouting "Oh, no it isn't!" from the sand in which their heads are buried we should see demands for action. Especially from the handful of Darwen representatives on the Council.

What's happened to Paul Browne? Surely he hasn't given up the ghost after banging his head against the wall for so long? But, then again, what can a lone Liberal voice do against the massed Labour ranks?

P Worthington

Bolton Road

Darwen

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.