Locals feel like 'being stuck in lockdown' at abandoned seaside town

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Locals have claimed they feel like they are 'stuck in lockdown' at an abandoned seaside town.Southport Pier, Merseyside has been closed for five months, leaving locals and business owners fighting to survive and in desperate need of a cash injection from the tourist seasonIt's claimed the Pavillion was deserted in a mad dash like something out of an apocalypse film - and that's because the council ordered its closure last December on health and safety grounds.Today there is still no sign of when life can return to the remarkable pier, which is country's second oldest.A Mirror reporter met with Colin Jamieson, who has run two businesses on the iconic structure for 20 years.One is the railway train that usually travels the length of the pier, which runs for 1km, and the other is the cafe business - which hasn't been able to operate since they had to shut up shop two weeks before Christmas due to 'ice-damage'.The 67-year-old is distraught, as he employs almost all of his family on the pier, and says it is like being in lockdown but without the financial support from the Government that he previously received during Covid."Any company that isn't trading for six months, it's going to go bust and the staff are going to leave.

It's terrifying, we have no income," he tells the Mirror."The longer it goes on, it's going to kill our company."I'm using what is left in the bank to keep things afloat.

I have two daughters, one is 42 and the other 35."They have homes and kids to look after and they aren't earning any money."Everyone works for me, my son-in-law works for me, the whole family works for me.

They're all suffering."No one wants to be seen as unethical and immoral. To do this to a company, to anyone, it's not right."Shaking