It has been another extremely difficult week for the High Street both in national terms and specifically for Bradford.

Jessops has shut down, HMV has gone into receivership, and Millets in Darley Street has also announced it will shut.

On top of that, Starbucks has revealed it is to close down its coffee shop on the first floor of the Waterstones store at the Wool Exchange.

There can be no doubt that this is a time of incredibly difficult trading conditions, and there is no easy short-term solution.

However, ways must be found to try to reinvigorate Bradford city centre, particularly as we are surely close now to work starting on the Westfield project at last.

One of the biggest problems facing many of these retail businesses in the current climate is their overheads, and the owners of the shops perhaps need to be more realistic about the level of rents. The last thing a landlord wants is an empty shop. They continue to pay business rates and it is dead money to them.

So it is in their interests to look at reducing rents to try to encourage businesses to keep trading during these difficult times.

What Bradford needs alongside the Regional Growth Fund money, which will hopefully bring new shops into the city centre, is a concerted effort to persuade landlords to reduce rents and accept lower margins to try to encourage more smaller independent traders to set up.

With the difficulties so many chain stores are facing the city needs a lot more independent retailers setting up shop. And as things pick up and the High Street chains look to the new development, smaller businesses can hopefully thrive in tandem with Westfield in the city centre.