Letter: Time for Shropshire to project itself as a business player
Economist Vicky Price has been speaking on the Government's record in various areas and I noted that "balancing the regions" was the lowest scored area and I would agree with that as a Shropshire resident.
I have been searching for records of EU grants in the area and although the infrastructure is there to provide them, so far I have not found one single example.
The budgets are there and some areas are sufficiently well structured to be ideal for Shropshire so why are they not there? I suspect that as an area we are not organised to pursue such things.
One major problem is that an area like Manchester when promoting its resources and business opportunities looks outwards to other areas and has organised itself to do so with active promotional drives. Shropshire looks inwards with a focus on local business serving local business.
So we are not getting a share of outside interest but worse still we are not defining ourselves as a region.
The Scottish devolution referendum put regionalisation at the top of the politician's agenda. At last they are coming to realise that Scottish opinion almost destroyed Cameron and could do the same elsewhere.
Revolution in the regions would almost certainly decide the next government hence talk of Northern and Midlands "powerhouses". Now is the time for Shropshire to focus on the image it projects.
An active drive to improve educational skills based around business might be an idea and there is an EU grant for that. It might just tempt big business into outsourcing into this area.
I have worked with large investment banks on setting up in new areas and once they get going they are quite good at it but Shropshire is not exactly Monaco and top management is not going to be thinking about running its back office here unless they see compelling argument. For that you need a good communications strategy and these tend to be pricey but there are angles one can take in planning such as regional campaigns and new business discounts that bring costs right down.
The county needs some more focus on things to build up momentum but really it should not be that difficult. A good start would grabbing a slice of the EU grant money mountain. They might even sponsor a development campaign.
Robin Lloyd, Ellesmere
