Councillor George Ayres who represents the New Addington Ward, said: "In the last 12 months New Addington has done very well in coming to grips with a lot of the problems that happened 12 months ago.

There was a strong community spirit on the night when people stood together and said "No, No more."

"The Co-op were very, very quick in committing themselves to staying and reopening in New Addington, which was extremely beneficial and restored confidence. Had it been left empty for any length of time the confidence of traders would have suffered significantly it would have been detrimental."