THIS has been a very worrying summer for the high street and neighbourhood retailing sector, with a wave of closures at high- profile names like HMV and Thornton’s helping to swell the number of stores closing each day to 20.

This has left almost 15% of high street premises empty.

That’s why Mary Portas’s appointment to conduct a review of UK high streets has been so crucial.

As part of her review, she will have to balance the impacts of poor retailing performance and outdated management, the rise of internet retailing, the prevailing squeeze on household incomes and the crucial loss of consumer confidence.

Couple this with other consumer concerns surrounding issues like parking, and it’s clear that this is no easy task.

Despite all of these variables, however, there is one overriding problem that must not be ignored.

This is the dramatic increase in retail investment located out of town.

Despite the fact that current planning policy requires councils to explicitly favour “town centre first” development, more than 80% of the 40m sq ft of new retail floor space in the pipeline will be located out of town.

Out-of-town development draws trade out of town centres, so traditional high streets suffer at the expense of the big sheds, and over time these smaller retailers become unviable.

Almost one in six shops on the high street are now closing their doors, while supermarkets continue in their goal to offer everything under one roof, competing viciously with each other as everyone else suffers.

The move out of town also kills the diversity and uniqueness of our high streets.

Our own research this year showed that only 15% of the public feel a sense of identity with their local high street.

That’s a sad indictment of our communities and it needs to change.

Mary Portas’s report will be a major opportunity to promote the importance of the high street, but it’s the less sexy, less media- friendly planning policy and the decisions made by councils that will deliver healthy high streets.