A SEASIDE town that has faced the closure of a number of big name shops is set to bid for up to £10million of Government cash aimed at helping struggling town centres.

Clacton’s Marks & Spencer and Mothercare, in Pier Avenue, have shut in recent months and the town’s Post Office in High Street is also earmarked for closure.

In response, Tendring Council set up the Clacton Town Centre Working Group last year to look at ways of improving the area.

The authority will now submit a bid to the Government’s Future High Streets Fund on behalf of the group.

The £675million fund is aimed at helping towns as they struggle to compete against internet retailers.

Graham Webb, chairman of Clacton Town Partnership, said: “Seaside towns have suffered more than most in recent years.

“There’s been a lack of investment from central and local government.

“We now have behaviour problems in the town centre, related to the influx of people being moved out of London, and big retailers are withdrawing. We need some investment to put us back on the map.”

The fund will contribute up to £25million to each successful town, but it is expected that most projects will be in the region of £5million to £10million.

Neil Stock, leader of the council, said: “This is clearly not an opportunity we want to miss out on.

“Crucially districts can make only one bid for one town centre per district.

“We have many small towns in Tendring across the district and all could benefit, but we can only go for one and Clacton has that critical mass which is necessary for this project.

“The Expression of Interest is not a commitment for a specific direction or project – rather it is a pitch to Government that Clacton should be one of the towns included in the High Street Futures Fund programme.

“This is hopefully the first step in a really positive direction for Clacton town centre.”

The first stage of the application is an expression of interest, with successful bids then going forward to a full business case application process.

Successful bids will be announced in July.