COMMENT We are 44 days into the new Labour government (exactly how long Liz Truss had been prime minister on the day she resigned) and we have certainly seen an energetic start. There have been more announcements than parking spaces at the Ikea on the North Circular. Most of which – at least as regards our own sector – are to be massively welcomed. But they’ll need to be bedded in. And the government will need to work closely with our industry to deliver.
In particular, the emphasis on place-based economic growth is to be grabbed at by us in property. Emphatically. Both hands.
Prioritising local growth
It was so very heartening to see the mayors of all the combined authorities summoned to Downing Street on day five and told to go back to their manors and prepare coherent growth plans for their areas by September. The mood was so chipper, all evidently thrilled to be finally at the top table, like children allowed back in the orchard – posing for selfies on the doorstep – bless ‘em. This was followed, in quick succession, by Angela Rayner writing to the leaders of all the county councils, similarly, to ask them to submit their own growth plans, to the same time frame.
All to be roundly welcomed. The signal is clear: bottom-up local economic growth is to be prioritised, supported and promoted. Dear EG readers, I urge you, do not stand on ceremony: write to all your mayors or county council leaders in any part of the country where you have a site. Pledge your support for economic growth in your patch. Put your shoulder to the wheel. Do it now.
I shall be following my own advice. Last November, it was my privilege to take up the reins as independent chair of the UK Innovation Corridor (you may remember it as the “London Stansted Cambridge Corridor” in old money), a venerable long-standing partnership of 15 local authorities, six universities and hundreds of life sciences companies, spanning the corridor from the King’s Cross Knowledge Quarter through to the powerhouse of Cambridge and all points in between.
They’re a lovely bunch and long used to working in partnership. For well over a decade, they have elected to quietly work together, bottom up, to foster economic growth in our sub region. Hosted by Avison Young, we launched our growth plan at MIPIM this year – in which we pledged to take the economy of the UK Innovation Corridor, which is at a none-too-shabby £189bn GVA today, to nearly double that, at £340bn by 2040. I think we will all agree there is not much not to like there.
As we span two mayoral regions – both the Greater London Authority and the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority – I am writing to both of our mayors, Sadiq Khan and Nik Johnson, to offer them all the support that the UK Innovation Corridor can muster, not just for what we can contribute to London and for Cambridge, although that is certainly on the table, but also as the essential bridge that links both of these globally important economies. Ditto, I shall be writing to the leaders of Hertfordshire and Essex to offer them the heft of our partnership in developing growth plans for both those (rather well-placed) counties, and the potential to share the love from both of the market-magnets of London and Cambridge, particularly when it comes to science and tech.
Science’s pivotal role
Our own UK Innovation Growth Plan has already been well received by the property industry – Jules Pipe, deputy mayor at the GLA, launched our growth plan for us back at MIPIM and Nik Johnson gave the keynote for us at UKREiiF. Add to this the argument that there isn’t the slightest chance that Sir Keir Starmer can possibly realise his ambition to make Britain the fastest growing economy in the G7 without putting science at the heart of the strategy in a way that encourages universities, entrepreneurs and corporations to have great ideas here and scale them up… well, we become most compelling indeed.
We offer a platform of science and tech, a knowledge economy, which is simply vital to what William Hague and Tony Blair recently described as the “new national purpose”. And we offer the energy and convening power of a long-standing partnership of civic, university and business leaders, well used to working together in an evolving eco system.
We all need friends. There is no substitute for longevity in partnership working. And the fact that we have long-standing excellent relationships with all these leaders means we can fast-track all our collective growth plans and hopefully start to really motor in the Innovation Corridor.
A bit of work to do then, but all to play for. I had vaguely been hoping to have a quiet August, but I’ve changed my mind. Let’s go.
Read the UK Innovation Corridor’s Growth Plan 2024-2030 >>
Read EG’s Working in Partnership guide >>
Jackie Sadek is independent chair of the UK Innovation Corridor and chair of the EG Public Sector Forum
