LAST year when the planning appeal went through allowing Cineworld to have their cinema on the Bowyers site, I spoke at the appeal and did warn of the potential downside of having a cinema operator holding a monopoly over the entire area as Odeon currently has.

All I read were letters in this newspaper and on its blog saying we don’t need another cinema chain here and that Trowbridge could not support another multiplex. How naive and wrong these people were and still are – they just don’t understand how multiplexes work in the 21st Century as compared to the High Street dinosaur cinemas of the past. More than ever, we need that Cineworld cinema on the Bowyers site to provide some effective competition.

Last Monday, the Bond film Spectre opened up across the country and what do we see in the Odeon Trowbridge? A blatant ramping up of the price of a ticket by £2 a seat, but thinly disguised as a Blockbuster ticket price. £11 to 12.50 for an evening seat is bordering on London West End pricing. This is an absolute disgrace for a cinema chain to implement in areas where they know they have a monopoly. Odeon please be aware this is not London neither are we in a city here.

The reason for the price hike I got from a staff member was that the film distributor asked for the price hike on the Bond film. I’m sorry but having worked in the cinema industry I know this would not be the case – the film distributor may have asked for a higher film rental from the box office but not a price hike on the ticket price. If it was a distributor request why didn’t Cineworld load their prices for this film too?

One thing is for sure, I guess we can all be safely assured that Odeon will do it again for the new Star Wars film in December. It’s blatant profiteering from a guaranteed audience.

When the public vent their fury in the press and on BBC’s Watchdog you know something’s not quite right. It’s bad enough that Odeon have removed their popular Bargain Tuesday and then Bargain Monday, relying on us to purchase insurance or some other catch to get us to get the Meerkat 2 for 1 pricing midweek. This may suit some but not the majority of people.

Odeon may be preparing themselves for sale, possibly to the Chinese, but do we have to be ripped off like this? The answer is no and so I return to Innox Riverside. Morrisons may still own the Bowyers site and Cineworld may still be interested in the site as well, their wiki site has shifted the date as ‘opening 2015’ to ‘opening 2016’. For all those who marched to support this site a few years ago, I hope Morrisons and Cineworld take note of the depth of feeling there is for them to be here in Trowbridge.

Indeed, Morrisons have just announced they may be going in with petrol stations to establish a new local representation. If this is the case, then build a smaller Morrisons with the petrol station on the Bowyers site, the eight-screen Cineworld still in position, and free up what was going to be the superstore and turn that over on the ground level to the ten pin bowling, ice rink and restaurants that people want, maybe with a hotel and/or apartments built over the top.

Good competition never did any harm but it will certainly be better, not just for Trowbridge, but the entire area.

Mike Baxter, Frome Road, Trowbridge