Health on the Highstreet
Business makes an important contribution to vibrant and healthy high streets, however there are some business practices which may negatively impact on the public's health.
The aim of our campaign is to work with businesses to better improve the health of their community and ensure that local authorities have the powers they need to curtail business practices which may undermine the public's health and the great work that many public health teams are doing.
What's the issue?
Our research explores how businesses on the high street can impact the health of the public and includes league tables ranking the "unhealthiest" high streets across London and the UK.
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Read the full report
There are over
2,000
Payday load shops located across the UK
HALF
of those people with debt have a mental problem and people with mental issues are six times more likely to have severe debt
Payday loan companies, credit providers lent out
£4.8 Bln
of high-interest credit
What the RSPH is calling for?
The report also includes a range of measures to make high streets more health promoting, including:
- Local authorities to be given greater planning powers to prevent the proliferation of betting shops, payday lenders and fast food outlets
- Public health criteria to be a condition of licensing for all types of business
- Mandatory food hygiene ratings linked to calorie and nutrition labelling for fast food outlets
- A limit of 5% of each type of business on a high street in order to avoid oversaturation and provide affordable choice
- Legislation to enable local councils to set their own differential business rates to encourage healthier outlets and discourage those that are detrimental to health.
Other work of the RSPH
We work closely with our members, the public health workforce and wider community to develop and implement a wide range of policy and projects to educate and empower individuals, effect change and celebrate excellence.
