Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
Trade and Industry Dinner
Egyptian Hall
Wednesday 2 March 2016
The Rt Hon The Lord Mayor of London
Alderman the Lord Mountevans
Secretary of State, My Lords, Ministers, Fellow Aldermen, Sheriffs, Ladies and
Gentlemen.
Welcome to the magnificent Mansion House, for an evening spent surrounded by the
great and the good, the exalted and the exceptional, of human history.
From King Alfred and Alexander the Great, to now, for the first time, Sajid Javid and Paul
Drechsler!
Welcome to you both – we hope to see you here on many future occasions.
“Innovate Here. Succeed Anywhere.”
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
This is my motto as Lord Mayor, a motto for British trade, British industry and Britain
itself, which for centuries has been a world incubator – a place where the best people
develop the best ideas.
That is why we’re all here tonight – so the City can celebrate the contribution of those
people, people like many of you.
With the EU referendum date now set, battle-lines are being drawn around the future
of our commercial heritage.
As Lord Mayor, it’s my job to take the City’s temperature. And from where I stand, the
view seems very clear: for reasons of investment, jobs and market access, Britain is
better off in.
In my view, if you shop at the supermarket, you benefit from the EU. If you have a bank
account, you benefit. If you study abroad, fall sick, apply for a mortgage, value our
security, draw a pension… whisper it, even if you prefer your croissants straight rather
than curved, you benefit. Thank you Tesco.
The alternative is years of uncertainty. Renegotiations, trade and investment, all
unclear.
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
The City Corporation will debate the issue tomorrow, and I hope that my fellow elected
representatives will reflect the overwhelming views of city stakeholders and businesses
– by voting to support the UK’s continued membership of the EU.
But I know, of course, that that’s not the only view.
One of the arguments in the referendum is whether we want to trade with the old
world… or with the new. We all want to do both.
But the fact is, without a properly-skilled workforce, we won’t do either.
Secretary of State. You said recently that if Britain wants to remain competitive, then
we need diverse, flexible and mobile employees. Those are qualities best developed at
work, including through apprenticeships run by knowledgeable and ambitious
companies.
Business – in the City and further afield – has a long tradition of supporting skills and
employability among young people.
Samuel Pepys, a City man through and through, and one closely associated with this
year’s 350th anniversary of the Great Fire of London, was an enthusiastic employer of
apprentices.
Indeed, one of them 1 worked his way up from manservant to MP, via stints at the
Admiralty and the Courts. Well, this being 1685, I suppose PPE at Oxford wasn’t an
option.
1
Will Hewer
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
And today, building on that tradition, we at the City Corporation have been looking at
what more we all can do to support young Londoners into work.
The City is already an Aladdin’s Cave of good practice: businesses providing mentoring,
offering worthwhile work experience, developing apprenticeships, working with
schools. The list goes on.
But we want to see that good practice adopted even more widely. So we at the City
Corporation have researched what more the Square Mile could do to support
employability.
The result is a new Employability Guide that we believe can be used by businesses to
support young Londoners into work.
We’ll ‘launch’ the guide on 21st March, here in the very heart of the City. And beyond
that, we’ll work with a kaleidoscope of organisations and institutions to embed its
principles around the City, creating a permanent and accessible culture of support and
getting more young people into good jobs.
But that’s not the end of the story. Back to Pepys – because as well as the importance of
skills and employability, he also knew something else. He demonstrated it as Secretary
to the Admiralty, when he guided huge investment in the infrastructure of the Royal
Navy; he demonstrated it when he transformed the standard of maritime education;
and, elsewhere, he demonstrated it when he helped found the Royal Society.
He knew the value of innovation.
Today the UK is up with Switzerland at the top of the Global Innovation Index. There are
more tech and innovation employees in London and the southeast, than in the whole of
California. 2 And this work plays an increasingly vital role across business and society.
2
https://www.mikebloomberg.com/content/uploads/sites/10/2015/06/London-Digital-City-On-The-Rise.pdf
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
We must be willing to back the innovation economy with more than just warm words.
We must develop it and nurture it, swaddle it and coddle it, into a sustainable, longterm source of wealth creation and technological expertise. It must have – and add –
volume and value across the country.
This year I’ll visit ten of the UK’s booming of economic hubs, big and small, which are
strengthened by each other and by the City of London.
As a result of their interdependence, those hubs buzz with expertise and ambition. Our
colleges and universities are world-class. SMEs are now among the most consistent
innovators, and they make up 99% of all our businesses. The open interface between
academic research and commerce is such a strength, and attracts innovators from all
over the world.
Ladies and gentlemen, there is much talk of continued growth, but I believe we have the
ingredients for enhanced growth, driven by enhanced productivity.
But to transform promise into reality, potential into results, we must have the
‘philosopher’s stone’ of a proper, well thought out long term vision. Where decisions
are taken for the good of the country, not just now, but five, ten, twenty years down the
line.
Pepys knew it. His vision led him to reshape the entire Royal Navy, with well-trained,
ambitious and outward-looking officers equipped for success. What followed was
centuries of unbroken naval superiority.
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
John Cridland, a veteran of these dinners and now one of the architects of the Northern
Powerhouse plan, has a similar vision. He says of our infrastructure that “like the
Victorian engineers, we have to take a leap of faith”. That metaphor is so relevant given
the discussions at Davos, where talk centred on the so-called ‘fourth industrial
revolution’, 3 during which global consumption, according McKinsey, will nearly double
by 2030. 4 That’s just 14 years away.
Business and government should reach for sustainable, inter-national success, in the EU
and elsewhere. Leveraging the FCO, UKTI, our talented Trade Envoys and every other
asset at our disposal. I came back from an African trade trip only this morning – so I
know from personal experience what tremendous assets they are.
Let’s back ourselves to think bigger, more optimistically, longer-term, and get our
country on track for the next stage of its development.
This is the vision we need, to do justice to the people who are working their way up the
ladder.
To the apprentices who strive diligently to learn new skills.
To the students who stay up ‘til dawn rewriting their essays – or at least that’s what my
sons told me they were doing.
To the employers who nurture and grow their staff.
To everyone who gets up early, goes to work and pays their taxes.
3
http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/news/1384401/innovation-scares-uks-mid-sized-manufacturers/
According to McKinsey http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/operations/our-insights/the-future-of-manufacturing
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-10/the-world-s-20-largest-economies-in-2030
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Thursday, 03 March 2016 11:31 AM
These are the people on whom our prosperity relies. And government and industry,
working together, innovating together, long term, will build our future success.
Secretary of State: I’m told you’re a great enthusiast of Star Trek, and have a close
familiarity with the Klingon language.
Well… as a small-time linguist myself, and with the City’s international – and one day,
who knows, intergalactic – outreach in mind, may I now address you briefly in Klingon.
And please forgive my ropey pronunciation, but: ‘British mech 'ej QuQ Daq!’
For those of you who aren’t the Secretary of State, allow me to translate: it means
“British trade and industry is our engine-room”.
From coast to coast, we will support that vision. And to cement it, may I ask you all to
rise for a toast. The toast is: “BRITISH TRADE AND INDUSTRY.”
1,300 words
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