Stakeholders, partners and interest groups are invited to submit evidence to the London-Stansted-Cambridge-Corridor Growth Commission.

The Growth Commission is independent and is set up to consider views and give recommendations based on evidence. If you have evidence or ideas for potential solutions to some of the major challenges facing the corridor, then we would like to hear from you.

WE REMAIN OPEN TO RECEIVING SUBMISSIONS - THERE IS STILL TIME

Please note that we need these submissions by 31 May 2016.

ISSUES AND DEADLINES

We ask that submissions are focused and relate to the terms and reference of the Growth Commission, and consider the following questions and issues:

Economic potential and change

• Is there are functional economy in the Corridor (or parts of it?)
• What is the economic potential of the Corridor, and the local economies that comprise it?
• What are the barriers or enablers to growth and development in the Corridor? how do we achieve sustainable growth - maintaining our competitiveness as a business location along with our high quality of life and good places to live and work.
• What is the growth trajectory of London and how does this affect the Corridor? how can we manage the opportunities and threats that may arise?

Understanding our advantages and strengths

• What are our current advantages, what could be new or enhanced further in the future?
• Who are our peers and competitors in the UK, Europe and Globally? what can we learn from them and about our place in the World?
• What are the collective assets or capabilities in the Corridor? what makes sense to collaborate on in terms of delivering better outcomes, and finding economies of scope and scale? what kinds of capabilities or assets could be better used or shared more widely across the Corridor?

Competitive location

• What are our strengths and weaknesses as an economic location - i.e. for businesses and talent?
• What are current business perceptions and experiences of the Corridor as a location? what does this mean for our future priorities?

Barriers to success

• What might prevent or undermine our ambitions and current advantages? how is this likely to occur? what are the long-term consequences?
• What can we do to overcome these barriers?

Delivering change

• The game-changers: what are the priority actions, and what difference will they make (or if we don’t deliver them, what does the future look like?)
• Infrastructure and sites: which infrastructural investments and employment sites will make the biggest impact or difference to the Corridor? what do they need to be delivered or succeed?
• New approaches: what kinds of new policies, tools, or initiatives could we use to help deliver the Corridor’s potential?
• What challenges do we have where we have no readily available policy or delivery solutions? how should we go about developing these in collaboration?
• What are the top collaborative initiatives?
• What should be the form of future collaboration?

Overall - the key deadlines for submissions are as follows:

A. If you want to give evidence or speak at an event - contact us as soon as possible. Email us using these contact details

B. If you want to give a written submission - then please do so by 31 May 2016

C. If you want to attend and event - then find the registration details via this page.

Alternatively - you can submit according to the themes of each Inquiry Event, outlined as follows:

At this stage, you can submit evidence on subjects relating to the inquiry events and work programme, including:

1. Understanding potential: submit for consideration for our interim report by 19 February 2016. Main questions and issues to cover include:

• What is tcurrent performance and potential of your local economy, business or industry? What might be the barriers to growth, or key enablers which might enhance growth and performance?
• What are the main industries or clusters that will drive future growth and jobs?
• How does the Corridor relate to, and deal with London’s growth and success?
• What do you regard as the critical economic and policy issues that require collaboration by organisations and businesses within the Corridor?
• What ambitions do you have for the Corridor and for some collaborative ventures or initiatives – whether public or private?

2. Building Potential: submit for consideration for our interim report by 19 February 2016. Main questions and issues to cover include:

• What is sustainable growth? Do you have a definition in use and operation?
• What is the growth scenario that we seek to aim for – in terms of industries, jobs, skills, quality of life and housing?
• What can each ‘node’ in the corridor can offer in terms of potential roles and developments?
• Who are the exemplar ‘ideas economies/ regions’, what we can learn from around the world? What places have you engaged with, have been impressed with, and why?
• What have other places like the LSCC area done to boost sustainable growth? What are some of the lessons and solutions that we could draw from?

3. Quality of place: submit for consideration for our interim report by 13 May 2016. Main questions and issues to cover include:

• The most successful ideas economies combine high levels of entrepreneurial and innovation capabilities and activities with high quality places to live and work. How do we ensure high quality business locations with sufficient capacity with expansion and also ensure quality of place and environment?
• What do businesses currently seek from their business locations? In particular, what do global businesses seek? How do our sites and premises measure up against business expectations? If they do not measure up, how does this affect business and economic performance?
• What are the capabilities in terms of strategic sites for employment and housing? What is needed to make these viable as high quality places?
• How can we build a world class infrastructure? What are the transport majors that are required to enable sustainable growth and development, and how can we ensure that they are realized?
• What new approaches to building quality of place might we apply? What new approaches have been tried to planning, design, infrastructure, employment sites and housing - that provide quality of place which meets the needs of residents, businesses, talent and investors?

4. Implementing change: submit for consideration for our interim report by 31 May 2016.

This inquiry event is different to the previous three, as it takes the main findings of the Growth Commission to date as its starting point.

Previous inquiry events have illustrated the fantastic growth track record of the corridor, and some outstanding industries and businesses. The Corridor is outstanding for R&D, technology, entrepreneurship and skills. This has helped to fuel the remarkable levels of population growth that have occurred in recent years and are forecast to continue.

However, the Corridor does not perform adequately in the physical and collaborative aspects of place-making. Transportation and telecommunications infrastructure is regarded as uncompetitive by international standards. Firms often find it difficult to expand on their current site or to access new high quality premises but retain their local workforce. Highly skilled workers commute for 1-2 hours each day, thus affecting their productivity, and there is insufficient local housing capacity to often accommodate workforce requirements. Cross-jurisdictional collaboration and partnership working around shared major infrastructure and skills issues is not as well advanced as in other competing global tech regions.Some of our leading firms have also told us that quality of place is very important, both in terms of quality and accessibility of business premises; and that their existing and potential workforce aspires to a high quality housing offer in a vibrant community.

Today’s event is about discussing potential solutions to the challenges identified. This leads to the main themes of the Fourth Inquiry Event:

• Solutions for providing competitive business locations and vibrant communities for talent: place-making for tech and knowledge-based economies.
• Delivering infrastructural capacity: how new financial tools might provide new means to address and accelerate our transport needs.
• Delivering housing: fresh thinking and sustainable solutions for addressing housing demand.
• Skills revolution: understanding future skills needs and developing the local workforce.

You can submit evidence in the following ways:

• Comment on the website – react to specific news items or releases
• Attend the Inquiry Events
• Email us using these contact details

Today we released our first expert evidence paper for the London Stansted Cambridge Corridor Growth Commission, authored by Professor Michael Enright, the world-renowned expert on corridor economies, knowledge regions and clusters.

Professor Enright’s paper (click here to download) offers a summary of his 30 years of experience, and directs this at the challenges facing the London-Stansted-Cambridge Corridor. He identifies a number of critical issues, and priorities for the Growth Commission to consider.

The LSCC Growth Commission aims to provide independent analysis and advice to raise the global economic potential of the London-Stansted-Cambridge Corridor, setting out a 30-year vision for transformational change.

To retain, and build the Corridor as a competitive location for business and talent

Professor Enright summarises the needs of a region which aims to compete and continue to succeed as a knowledge – based and creative economy as:

• World class infrastructure
• Appropriate industrial/ business sites and premises
• Multiple skills (at all levels, e.g. being able to support provision of skills whether through training institutions and/or providing the right environment to live and work for leaders and highly-skilled professionals)
• Attractive working and living spaces – in particular as senior professionals and leaders are highly mobile and will choose the most attractive places to live, work and do business

Some particular challenges for the Corridor

• Complex governance – the multiple jurisdictions of local authorities and organisations, and the relative position of Central Government in terms of control over resources
• Infrastructural challenges – it is a valid question to ask whether current infrastructure is competitive with other knowledge economies, and whether it is sufficient to encourage further investment and economic activity
• Understanding capabilities, assets and potential – there is perhaps insufficient analysis and insight in terms of the capabilities, supply chains and clusters, and opportunities – i.e. what constitutes the Corridor?
• Identifying the nodes in the Corridor, understanding where there is critical mass – is the Cambridge economy of a sufficient scale and scope to support the corridor as the counterpart to London? Are there sufficient nodes of scale/scope between London and Cambridge?

About the author

Professor Michael Enright, The University of Hong Kong and Enright, Scott & Associates

A global expert on regional economic development and industry clusters, Professor Enright’s research has focused on international competitiveness, regional clustering of industry, and economic development. He has directed or co-directed major reviews of economies in 20 countries on five continents and has co-authored ten books on competitiveness and numerous papers on regional clustering.

Professor Enright is one of the LSCC Growth Commission’s Expert Advisors.

Harvey Mcgrath to lead 30-year vision to establish the London – Stansted – Cambridge Corridor as one of the leading economies within Europe

The leading philanthropist and senior businessman, Harvey McGrath has today been appointed to chair an independent Growth Commission established to build the ambitions and actions needed to strengthen the London– Stansted - Cambridge Corridor as a world-leading area economy.

With its £161 billion economy the London –Stansted-Cambridge Corridor has outperformed the national economy over recent years. Linking the world’s leading university and its high tech cluster with the world’s leading city with its cosmopolitan growth and a diverse, globalised business base – the Corridor is poised for significant growth.

Harvey McGrath, commented upon agreeing to Chair the Growth Commission:

As part of London, and with a successful tech-based economy in its own right, the London – Stansted – Cambridge Corridor could achieve significant international success over the next thirty years – but we need to articulate how this will happen. I will be working with the other Growth Commissioners to ensure that public and private sector leaders and investors are left in no doubt of its enormous potential, and there is agreement on the key collaborations and actions needed to realise this.

Background notes

Harvey McGrath has had a long and distinguished career in the international financial services industry, and is the former chair of Prudential plc, the London Development Agency, London First and Man Group plc. He is also Deputy-chair of the Mayor of London’s London Enterprise Panel (LEP), the local enterprise partnership for the capital.

The Growth Commission has been established by the Board of The London Stansted Cambridge Consortium (LSCC) – a partnership of public and private organisations based along the fast-growing economic corridor between London and Cambridge. A world leader in high tech and bioscience, the corridor accounts for 20% of England’s digital economy and life science workers. Investment in transport connections along the corridor will mean more high-tech businesses and jobs which are a driver of growth and the key to the UK’s future prosperity.

The Commission will also draw upon the expertise of highly regarded experts including internationally renowned economist, Professor Michael Enright, to strengthen the case for investment to support smart, high quality growth playing a significant role in the UK’s future economy. Professor Enright has consulted extensively on business strategy, regional economic competitiveness, and economic development and is known as “one of the world’s reigning strategy gurus”.

Evidence sessions will commence in January, following a period of research and there will be a call for written evidence in the New Year. The commission will launch their findings and recommendations in June 2016.

Professor Michael Enright, providing independent advice to the commission commented that:

“The London-Stansted-Cambridge Corridor is one of the key high growth opportunity areas for the UK and I am delighted to be working with the commission. With a vision and plan to invest in a high quality business location capable of attracting global talent, the corridor will be poised to become a pre-eminent regional economy – both nationally and internationally.”