Business leaders have criticised a report that said their town was stuck in a rut.

A study by consultancy and research organisation the Work Foundation said Hastings needed a drastic change of fortune for it to keep pace with rival towns.

The report into the country’s 56 main cities and towns said that places such as Reading, Bristol, Manchester and Newcastle had made substantial gains in economic growth over the past decade by attracting higher value businesses and skilled jobs.

But it said Hastings had failed to improve in the same way.

Alexandra Jones, the associate director of the foundation and one of the report’s authors, said: “Some big cities have clearly bounced back from the decline of manufacturing, and have galvanised themselves to be productive, thriving, 21st century places.

“But look at the next tier and political alarm ought to set in. The stuck cities of Britain have rising proportions of people in low socio-economic groups and very low rates of employment in better paying professional jobs.

“Their businesses have low productivity rates. Many refuse to recognise that their economic future relies on trade links with a neighbouring city that, despite being a historic rival, is now thriving. And they are often blighted by either chaotic or complacent leadership.”

The report states that between 1981 and 2001 the number of professionals in Hastings decreased by 0.6% whereas in Brighton it increased by 13.9%.

But Linda Williams, chamber of commerce manager at business group 1066 Enterprise in Hastings, said: “In the past ten years there has been so much investment both public and private in the town.

“We are still, in terms of unemployment and low wages, worse than the rest of East Sussex but the disparity is less now than it was previously. To say we are failing I think is wrong.”

Hastings Borough Council leader Peter Pragnell said the town had drifted into becoming inactive after the Second World War because of the rise of package holidays and that attempts to recruit workers and residents from London in the 1970s had failed.

He said: “We are now on the up slope. It is going to take a while."

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