More than one shop in every ten has closed within the past nine months, according to findings that show how the diverging fortunes of shopkeepers are shaping high streets.

Sightings of independent florists and small bookstores have become increasingly rare. A survey of more than 700 town centres found that 233 florists closed in the first nine months of the year, including more than 11 per cent of independent flower shops. Nearly 13 per cent of independent bookshops — or 731 — shut in the same period.

Fashion retailers emerge among the recession’s leading casualties, with independent shops proving less able to weather the downturn than giants such as Next, Marks & Spencer and Debenhams.

The survey, by the Local Data Company, found that nearly 18 per cent of women’s wear and children’s wear shops closed, and 15 per cent of independent fashion shops. Travel agents and estate agents are also faring badly, with 13 per cent of them shutting as the housing market and tourism suffer. Nearly one in 12 bars, pubs and clubs closed. However, food shops have appeared relatively resilient. Independent bakers, butchers and fishmongers fared better than average, with between 7 per cent and 9 per cent closing down.

The proportion of empty shops has risen to 12 per cent.

Liz Peace, head of the British Property Federation, said that the figures highlighted the need to reduce business rates for empty properties and to delay the rise in rates next year. “These figures show the real dent caused by our broken high streets. Rather than continue making empty promises, it is vital that the Government looks at offering some real help to businesses,” she said.

The data also illustrates the toll taken of the high street by the slowdown in the housing market. In the 705 town centres examined, 1,211 electrical goods and home-entertainment shops shut, and more than 1,300 furniture, carpet, bathroom and kitchen shops closed.

Richard Hyman, strategic retail adviser to Deloitte, the accountancy firm, said that fashion retailers were beginning to suffer from the slump in the pound. “We’re witnessing a shift in the economics of retailing, nowhere more spectacularly than in fashion. We have seen ten years of falling prices. One of the driving forces has been an incredibly strong exchange rate — overvalued sterling is not going to return.”

Stephen Robertson, of the British Retail Consortium, said: “We need a co-ordinated plan of action that includes Government cushioning retailers from the worst effects of revaluation on next year’s business rates bills and scrapping planned increases in national insurance.”

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