COMMENT from Jackie Sadek, Chair, UK Innovation Corridor
Here is my big question: what is Sue Gray actually going to do?
I’m sure wasn’t the only one to cheer when I heard Ms Gray had been appointed to be “envoy to the nations and regions of the UK”. I guess she could have done without that torrid summer (says she, flippantly), but there you go. Onwards and upwards. Our gain, I reckon.
Darned straight we need a high-profile envoy. Bring it on!
Regional voices
I speak having just returned from the chalk face. Fresh (sic) from Expo Real in Munich, where 40,000 men in blue suits with brown shoes have tried to wrestle that wall of European investment – the one that we all know is out there, even if we can’t quite grasp it – to the ground.
In an attempt to attract some of that wall of investment, the valiant UK Cities and Partners stand staged a great programme of events.
On the first day, I found myself chairing a most illuminating panel of city and regional leaders: Joe Manning of MIDAS, Manchester’s inward investment agency; Gavin Quinn championing the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, where he is head of commercial development; Dagmar Steffens waving a flag for the West of England Combined Authority, as head of innovation and inward investment; and Frances Moffett-Kouadio, strategic investment director for the Thames Estuary Growth Board.
We were admirably supported by James Needham of Shoosmiths and James Sherwood of Luton Rising, giving us the investors perspective. It was a feisty showing and it demonstrated huge commonality of purpose.
And the upshot? The distillation of all this glorious expertise? It could be summarised in three words: let’s get serious.
Read more: Can Gray help the UK get serious on growth? | EG News (egi.co.uk)
