Business deserves better from planners

Our local enterprise partnership, GFirstLEP, has provided that voice and as its vice chair and director of Business West, I was concerned that this independent voice is maintained. That’s because GFirstLEP is gradually being integrated into the county council.

How could you guarantee to business that GFirst will continue as the independent voice-free from politics?

I put that concern of business to county council leader, Mark Hawthorne. He told me: “I think you will end up seeing it as a balance between the demands and needs of the county council from a growth perspective and the demands and views of busin esses.

“If we are going to have sensible growth in our county it needs to be planned. It needs to be in the right places and it needs to be integrated with the infrastructure, transport and housing delivery.”

I agree entirely, that’s why GFirstLEP  and the county council now have to deliver a new, Local Industrial Strategy together. And that togetherness of purpose for the growth of our businesses needs good ideas and support from all of our six district councils.

GFirstLEP produced what we thought was a worthwhile Local Industrial Strategy, but it was sidelined by the government’s Build Back Better strategy. We now need a new plan for business in Gloucestershire.

I believe that strategy must put skills at the top of the list if we are to try and increase productivity and thereby achieve the holy grail of growth.

My personal view is that the integration of GFirstLEP with the county council to form our own county economic powerhouse is a no-brainer.

It is entirely sensible in terms of the limited financial resource available to GFirst, and the county’s intention to pursue their devolution aspiration to get a county deal from government. But politics must not get in the way of encouraging businesses to invest and grow in our county.