By the time we marched bravely into the 21st century, even though so much had changed, Barlick still retained its old character. We had a thriving town centre with a good mix of shops, the schools were fully subscribed and we had managed to avoid much of the late 20th century blight of 'redevelopment'. Once more, Barlick's unique position as an outlier had kept the developers largely at bay. We still had our stone-built heritage and many of the houses that twenty years before qualified as sub-standard property were, in an era of rising property prices, desirable town centre cottages. Back to back houses were changing hands at unheard of prices and other properties also enjoyed the general upsurge. Employment was holding up well and the only people who were suffering was the young as they tried to get on to the housing ladder.
We didn't realise it at the time but wider changes were afoot. As successive governments tried to rein in spending, new employment conditions became common, gone were the days when you could have a job for life, many jobs were on annual contracts, a great loss in security. In another part of the forest the banks and the financial industries were taking full advantage of the relaxation of regulation that had started in the 1960s and though we didn't realise it at the time were living in the last chance saloon. We saw the stories of young bloods in the City having champagne lunches and driving round in Ferraris but it didn't have much impact. The City had always been like that.
We all know what happened in 2008.... The whole flimsy edifice of inter bank credit collapsed solely due to greed and mismanagement. The trouble was it threatened to take us all with it. Governments panicked, threw all the loose change to institutions 'too big to fail' and then realised that they couldn't run the country without massive borrowing. This started a rush to 'sound money' just as it did in the 1920s and the immediate effect was the imposition of austerity from which we suffer to this day.
Funding was cut to local government and welfare and unemployment started to rise. Pay was frozen in the public sector (apart from the higher executives who funnily enough began to command bigger and bigger wages) We saw the beginnings of cuts in social services and worst of all in some deprived areas of the borough infant mortality and child poverty started to rise.
The effects of these changes for the worse was reflected in our retail shops. For the first time in living memory we saw empty shops in the town centre, poor people were starting to feel the pinch and changed their shopping habits. 85% of domestic consumer spending is generated by these people and as austerity bit home the fall in disposable incomes was reflected in National GDP. Exactly what had happened in 1920 but some people never learn. Barlick needed a minor miracle!
Empty shops became available for other purposes.
