Lots of councils and Chambers of Trade up and down the country must be scratching their collective heads with the huge dilemma that is, 'what to do about the High Street'.

In an already bleak trading climate, the last year - without stating the obvious - has sealed the fate of many more historic and household names. But whose fault is it?

Times have certainly changed over the past 30 years, and there is little doubt the online brands have served to give traditional shops a run for their money. But what have those shops done to compete? What have shoppers come to demand, or possibly been forced to accept?

All business is about profit and the chains of well-known names grew like mushrooms over this period, to the extent that every large town and city has, or had the same generic shops on its high street.

The emergence of a certain large, mixed clothing store became a big player. Shoppers could be seen making off home with armfuls of carrier bags and had maybe only spent £20, and this is still the case.

Gradually well-established mid-priced high street shop brands have found it necessary to buy in lesser-quality goods, sold at budget prices, to try to lure consumers away from this new-found competition and protect their brand.

However, in my opinion, the result has been a poor offer of poor quality goods, duplicated many times over. A lot of shops are/were selling the same thing, just with a different label. There are a few exceptions but consumers have become bored.

It has proved a massive problem and the result is the closure of shops one-by-one as shoppers find the market flooded with merchandise they don't want to buy. There has been a race to the bottom, geared to a market where cheap is key. You only have to look at sale racks, and the amounts of garments unsold.

Diminishing sales together with high city centre rents and crippling business rates has now come home to roost, and we have what we have: the demise of chains of retail stores, established for decades in the UK.

So what is the answer in a city such as Carlisle, where our shopping streets look pretty grim in parts and the future is uncertain because of coronavirus?

The truth is, I haven't a clue! We have to hope there is a plan and some vision for the funding from the Future High Streets Fund which the city has secured.

Linda Nicholson

Carlisle