Speaker 1: So I think you have to be careful not to
Speaker 1: talk ourselves into a position where we are saying that
Speaker 1: the UK is all at CD use your words adrift.
Speaker 1: I think the UK has a huge amount to offer.
Speaker 1: We have a lot of extraordinary businesses and amazing talent pool.
Speaker 1: We have to be careful, I think, not to talk
Speaker 1: ourselves into a dark spot, because that's not the UK
Speaker 1: that I think I recognize and that I think we
Speaker 1: will want to build.
Speaker 2: Do you think that government believes that it is their
Speaker 2: job to address the issues of business, because when I
Speaker 2: speak to business people, you know, these issues are well known.
Speaker 2: Are they listening?
Speaker 1: I think it really depends where you are and what
Speaker 1: your sector is. You know, I hear wildly different things.
Speaker 1: People who are in my background are the kind of
Speaker 1: high growth tech sector. They hear language coming out of
Speaker 1: government about wanting to build you know, AI friendly environment.
Speaker 1: We're starting more digital businesses than ever before. We've got
Speaker 1: more to use the word I hate the most unicorn
Speaker 1: companies than many countries across the world and certainly in Europe.
Speaker 1: So if you're in that sector, I think you might
Speaker 1: feel that government is really listening and that you have
Speaker 1: you know, you understand the direction of travel, but that's
Speaker 1: not true across other bits of the country and other sectors.
Speaker 1: So to go back to Doncaster or where I was
Speaker 1: this week, you know, Doncas has just had its airport closed,
Speaker 1: it didn't get the hospital that it was hoping for,
Speaker 1: and these things really impact in the local economy and
Speaker 1: there was extremely harsh criticism of the leveling up agenda
Speaker 1: in that area, and I think if you're sitting in
Speaker 1: certain places then you're completely right. It feels as though
Speaker 1: maybe there aren't the priorities that you'd hope for, and
Speaker 1: the clarity is, you know, far from obvious. So it
Speaker 1: does really depend and that I think is a problem.
Speaker 1: You know, the government needs to show that it's listening
Speaker 1: to not just one area of business but the whole
Speaker 1: country and really responding to the needs of businesses across
Speaker 1: multiple different sectors. If we're going to return to the
Speaker 1: growth that we all think we want and can achieve.
Speaker 2: On executive pay, would that make the difference to creating
Speaker 2: more competitive businesses or businesses that would IPO in London
Speaker 2: as opposed to the US scale up? Is that a
Speaker 2: key factor?
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's the key factor. I think
Speaker 1: that talent in its macro form is at fundamental right.
Speaker 1: You know, I think the thing that perhaps has surprised
Speaker 1: me the most it's becoming president, is just not the
Speaker 1: need for more skills in this country, but actually it's
Speaker 1: just finding people, retaining people, making sure that we have
Speaker 1: got the talent that we need across the whole piece.
Speaker 1: And I would use the word there's a kind of
Speaker 1: people's crisis in this country. So there's always debates, people
Speaker 1: saying we don't pay enough, we don't pay well compared
Speaker 1: to the US. People leave this country because of pay
Speaker 1: and that possibly the case, but there are other reasons
Speaker 1: to be in the UK. It's an incredibly clement business
Speaker 1: environment in many ways. I'm not sure it's the only
Speaker 1: piece I really I recognize for some businesses it's important.
Speaker 1: I think the bigger challenge here is that so many
Speaker 1: businesses are facing such a tightening of the labor market.
Speaker 2: In terms of that industrial strategy, do you think that
Speaker 2: there is reluctance to dig down and actually come up
Speaker 2: with a big national economic strategy akin to Germany's or
Speaker 2: China's or now the US is in Europe When it
Speaker 2: comes to the green economy.
Speaker 1: I don't think we're doing enough from fast enough on
Speaker 1: a green economy. No. I think that, you know, the
Speaker 1: targets and the ambitions to reach that zero are one
Speaker 1: part of this, but I think, you know, talking to businesses,
Speaker 1: there's so many things we're not doing to help them
Speaker 1: scale up. You know. I was horrified again to go
Speaker 1: back to some of the visits that I've made recently
Speaker 1: about the constructions just around the national grid and for
Speaker 1: some businesses to be able even to connect to it
Speaker 1: to enable some of their green transition. So there's plenty
Speaker 1: more that we need to unlock, and I feel businesses
Speaker 1: frustration in not being able to convince government to take
Speaker 1: some of the steps to make sure that we're really
Speaker 1: building our strengths and also helping the businesses that need
Speaker 1: to transition themselves.
Speaker 2: We've had quite a chaotic period of government would quite statement.
Speaker 2: So I mean, I would say also over the whole
Speaker 2: thirteen year period actually of conservative government, in some ways
Speaker 2: you could call it quite fragile and pretty chaotic. More recently,
Speaker 2: is the UK now paying the price for that fragility
Speaker 2: and that sort of government chaos.
Speaker 1: I do think you need to have if not, you know,
Speaker 1: one level of stability. Economically, you need businesses to feel
Speaker 1: most importantly that they can look ahead with certainty that
Speaker 1: there's not going to be this constant rotation and chaos.
Speaker 1: You know, it's business relies on certainty, and we've got
Speaker 1: lots of people that want to invest in this country,
Speaker 1: but they want to see that this country is not
Speaker 1: going to go through these immense periods of chaos as
Speaker 1: you've described. You know, I would argue that we have
Speaker 1: had periods of stability, of course, you know, the coalition government.
Speaker 1: Now when we look back on it, I think feels
Speaker 1: like a period of certainty over the last thirteen years
Speaker 1: that you know, we haven't enjoyed in the last five
Speaker 1: or six. So yes, of course we need to have that,
Speaker 1: and I really hope that whatever the results the next election,
Speaker 1: we will look on the global stage as like a
Speaker 1: country that has sorted out its political and the meanderings,
Speaker 1: to use some other generous word, and gives confidence both
Speaker 1: for inward investment and the internal investment that we need.