The decaying shell of Ravens Court, Brownhills. This won’t be going anywhere anytime soon, but that’s nothing to do with local OAP’s and everything to do with Tesco’s downturn.

There’s something odd going on at the moment, that I’d like to get to the bottom of. I’ve now seen four separate instances of the incorrect assertion that the Senior Citizen’s protest stopped the Brownhills Tesco Redevelopment. The first was the letter in the Express & Star I dismantled a couple of weeks ago. I’ve since picked up the same incorrect tale in a Brownhills pub, on social media and in a local shop. I’m perplexed. I can’t believe one letter in the local paper has such a universal reach. Something is going on.

There’s a technique in the public relations and the spin doctor industry called ‘Poisoning the Well’ – it refers to the practice of subtly spreading misinformation on a topic so that the overall picture is confused or misunderstood. This can be helpful to companies and institutions trying to avoid blame. I’m wondering if, following the bad publicity Tesco received over their backtracking on the Brownhills development, particularly on Rdio WM, that the company have been managing their reputation in this area a little.

Please, if you hear any incidences of this statement – the truth of which is that the OAP’s protested, and Tesco made concessions, following which the plans for a new store were approved over a year ago – please do let me know. That the protestors stopped a bright new dawn in Brownhills seems an oddly pervasive untruth that I’m keen to counter, and I really would like to identify the source.

Your help is appreciated with this.

BrownhillsBob at Googlemail dot com. Cheers.