In October I attended the Conservative party conference, channelling the majority of my time into events focusing on the North East.
The pressing concern of the economy and an analysis of our areas performance in the context of the rest of the UK were key areas of discussion. There was general consensus that government decisions such as the route of the planned high speed rail network would massively affect our regions capacity to win business and investment in the future. It was excellent to have input from a range of sources including large organisations such as Northumbria Water, public sector employers including the NHS (the largest employer in the N.E at 70,000 on the payroll) as well as feedback from smaller enterprises and business think tanks.
I also had the privilege of attending Martin Callahan’s (MEP for the north east) evening event and listening to a lively discussion on our place in Europe. David Cameron nicely rounded off my agenda as I sat in the main hall to hear his vision of governance of the UK. It was surprisingly emotional hearing the whole speech from start to finish, and far more coherent in thought than the snippets we are fed on news.
