Voices is the Dorset Echo's weekly youth page, written for young people by young people. If you would like to write an article for voices, please email alex.cutler@dorsetecho.co.uk

THE DISCOUNT fashion store, Primark is soon to open eighteen new stores, with nine of the first ten revealed to be in European countries, with only one in the UK, which is in the Trafford Centre, Manchester.

Dorset has a Primark in Poole and Bournemouth, but the opening of these new stores has led to the question whether Weymouth or Dorchester should have its own Primark store.

While department stores such as House of Fraser and Debenhams shutting their doors, discount stores such as Primark, Home Bargains and B&M are opening their doors each year.

In September 2018, Weymouth got its own Home Bargains store in Littlemoor, on the site where Budgens used to be. To save Weymouth and Dorchester’s shopping facilities, we can now only hope a new Primark store will open and the Weymouth Gateway retail development will go ahead.

Not only is there the social factor that we will have another shopping facility, but numerous new full and part time career opportunities will come with it, let alone the benefit’s to Weymouth or Dorchester’s economy. As Dorchester is a smaller town with a lack sites large enough to support a Primark store, Weymouth has the possibility of opening a new store in more locations.

As Weymouth is in the top 10% for being one of the most deprived boroughs, a cheap store like Primark should flourish.

By James Sullivan