STALL holders have given a cautious welcome to the move which could see Royston Town Council taking over therunning of Royston market. North Herts District Council has accepted a joint application from the town council and the Royston Town Centre Forum to

STALL holders have given a cautious welcome to the move which could see Royston Town Council taking over therunning of Royston market.

North Herts District Council has accepted a joint application from the town council and the Royston Town Centre Forum to assume control of the market.

If this approved at a meeting of the town council's finance committee on Monday evening then it will take over on July 1.

Andy Tucker, of Tucker and Sons fishmongers, said: "Hopefully the market will now be back to how it should be.

"If you have a private company involved in running it they can get greedy."

This view was echoed by Bernie Bottesch, who runs the plant stall.

He said: "We might now see some changes for the better.

"There are fewer stalls than ever, and it might help get people in if there was some free parking available."

Derek Cox, who has had his clothes stall on the market for the last 22 years, said he does good business.

But he added that the number of stall holders had been in decline for "some years".

"When I first started coming here there were probably more than 20 stalls, now we only have eight to 10 regulars.

"We need to attract more stalls which sell things people actually want.

"Too often you see stall holders are there for a week or two then you never see them again because there was no demand for what they were selling."

John Sims has been trading at the market since 1964, and believes parking is an issue for shoppers.

He said: "The town will improve when people have somewhere to park which they can afford.

"I'd like to see the council look into making a couple of the car parks, such as the town hall car park or the Fish Hill car park, free for people to use on market days.