Ten years ago, this town was different, safer. You could leave your door unlocked at night, but those days are long gone.

Last week at M&S on Main Street, a gang of young thugs rampaged through the store like they owned it, snatching items from shelves and pushing employees around. One woman said it felt like war had come to our quiet corner of Britain.

It's happened before but never with such brazen disregard for law or consequence. The CEO of M&S was so upset he wrote to both the Home Secretary and London Mayor, pleading for help to stop this tide of violence sweeping through retail establishments.

The letter detailed a week full of aggressive incidents targeting store staff, showing that organized crime cells are now using our local businesses as their playgrounds. It's not just about broken windows anymore, it's people getting hurt.

When I lived here 40 years back, we had different priorities in government. The streets were cleaner and safer then. Nowadays...

M&S isn't the only one suffering either; other major retailers have reported similar issues to their local authorities but nothing seems to change quick enough. It's getting worse every day.

Back when people still believed in tough laws, crime was much harder to commit. Now it feels like nobody cares anymore. Is this really how we want our future?