I'M not very happy about being branded an enemy of progress along with others who oppose another out-of-town supermarket as the only solution for the town's problems.

In fact I thought it was very 1980s — the idea of decimating the town centre by building out of town shopping, or letting developers build homes on greenfield sites.

There is no way that letting Tesco build an out-of-town store is going to improve the town centre; that has never happened before and it is not going to happen now, however many people kid themselves that it will.

We must hold off more out-of-town development because it is irreversible; personally, I can wait a very long time before I eat another cheap, supermarket ready meal anyway.

Tesco et al aren't going to ever stop being interested in getting a foothold in Tavistock, so we should carry on waiting, debating and (how about this?), even doing some planning for the kind of town we want for ourselves and our descendents and not just throw in the towel and have it dictated to us by developers and their cohorts.

James Gibson

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