Sir,

We are writing to object in the strongest possible terms to the planning application for a supermarket development in Spring Gardens, Narberth, which comes before the planning committee of Pembrokeshire County Council next Tuesday.

Narberth's county councillor Wynne Evans is on record as saying "This is a major employment boost for the local economy, that will be welcomed by all." Anyone who believes that a supermarket in Narberth will lead to a net increase in jobs is ignorant of the ABC of economics or the 123 of arithmetic.

All recent research evidence suggests that it would ruin its small, local competitors and establish a local monopoly. Those jobs that are created will be low paid and less flexible, often with unsocial hours, compared with those that will be lost.

Not only will there be a net loss of jobs; money will drain from the local economy also. Most of the receipts of a supermarket leave the locality within 48 hours. In contrast, money spent with local businesses has a multiplier effect.

Local businesses enhance reciprocal relationships; in other words they contribute to community and the creation of social capital.

The developers' excuse for not attending the public meeting organised by AM Angela Burns in Narberth on June 3, where the majority was against the development, was a cheap shot from the bag of dirty tricks supermarkets use on these occasions. They will not give up easily; the gloves are off. But it does rather show that they are not interested in serving the community of Narberth, rather only in exploiting it.

Narberth has been ill-served by the county council of late with a triple whammy: first, its expropriation of the Town Moor car park, which, as common land, belongs to the people of Narberth not to the PCC; second, its refusal to move the library into the old primary school and thereby improve access and facilities, particularly for the less mobile and car-less - an opportunity lost also to develop other community facilities; third, the massive hike in business rates that has already seen shops that serve the local community go out of business.

We are in danger of being left, as in so many other places following a similar business model, with a town full of charity shops and shops that service, as one of the candidates in the recent general election put it, 'those with high disposable income' - mostly from out of town.

And now the PCC has put the old school up for sale. Going for the quick buck of planning gain, if indeed any is on offer, will destroy the very diversity that presently makes Narberth so attractive to all. It will kill the goose that lays the golden egg!

This all comes on top of the local authority's ongoing failure to address either the traffic problem here, which regularly sees the one-way system grid-locked, or the issue of residents' parking in the town centre. A supermarket in Narberth would be another nail in the coffin of Narberth's community.

It is to be hoped that the PCC will not be to be seduced by the siren call of the supermarkets' PR, which, we are sure, is very plausible. An alternative vision for sustainable development is being presented by Transition Town Narberth, for both community development and strengthening local markets. Both a cohesive community and a developed local economy will provide us with greater insulation from the instability of international markets, less dependence on a volatile financial system, greater food security and greater resilience to the structural adjustments that approaching peak oil and climate change will bring.

It is to be hoped that the PCC will in future work with these plans instead of imposing, top-down: out-dated thinking; blinkered business models, and short-sighted solutions.

May we suggest that the county council purchases the old Brains depot site for residents' parking? Building lock-up garages for use by residents of the town centre would meet an immediate need, and we are certain there would be sufficient demand to make this a viable option.

Elaine Nicholas,

Martin R. Paine,

Narberth.