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Insider Birmingham Economic Forum: Big City Debate
Issues ranging from local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) to high speed rail and from marketing to regeneration were given a thorough airing at Insider’s Birmingham Economic Forum, held at KPMG’s offices at One Snowhill.
Around 100 business people turned out for the breakfast event and heard Jack Glonek, assistant director investment of enterprise and employment, at Birmingham City Council say that the new LEPs represented an opportunity. “We’ve got the opportunity to take hold of the agenda. We will have to do things differently but that is interesting,” he said.
But Lorraine Holmes, chief executive of Business Link West Midlands, said she feared for the future of business support “My biggest concern is that some of the key functions we will need to drive forward the local economy are not at the moment sitting in the LEP proposals but have been pulled back to Whitehall; things like business support, inward investment and international trade.”
Gary Taylor, executive director at developer Argent, said the climate for property development remains poor. “Getting funding for development is nigh on impossible at the moment. I don’t think we will see developments coming forward in Birmingham for the next two to three years on a speculative basis,” he said.
And Steve Hollis, senior partner at KPMG in the Midlands, said establishing decent transport links around the city centre is a must. “If you got to any modern city in the world and it’s about how quickly you can get around it. The Victorians worked it out in London more than a hundred years go,” he said.
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