26 June 2009

Be Birmingham conference

1. It’s a giant privilege to speak to you this morning and I want to thank my friend Ian Austin for the invite to come along today

2. It’s a privilege because this is my first chance to make a speech in Birmingham, in my new job as Chief Secretary to the Treasury, almost exactly five years from the moment I threw my hat into the ring of the Hodge Hill by-election, and started my career in public life in the city.

3. If there is one reason I am in this job today, it is because of the things that so many of you have taught me, and showed me and inspired me to do over the last 1,800 days – and for that I want to say an enormous and very personal thank you.

4. In your work today you are showing off the finest traditions of public life in this city;

5. It is truly impressive to see the way you are facing up to every force ranged against us; the force of this global economic storm; or the force of this global pandemic; you are showing off the best of Birmingham and you are showing nothing beats Birmingham.

6. That is why I say with confidence that we will ride out today’s rough seas.

7. And that is why what I would like to talk about this morning is my view of the future that lies beyond the storm. Not based on my experience as a minister. Nor, what I’ve seen as an MP. But on my work as a community organiser, in my corner of East Birmingham.

8. I said that this week is a bit of an anniversary for me.

9. But this year is also an important anniversary for our city.

10. It was a hundred years ago this year that our city took the irrevocable steps to becoming Britain’s second city.

11. After years of debate in council, it was in 1909, that the government of the day concluded that Aston, Erdington, Handsworth, Kings Norton, Northfield, Yardley should come within the city limits.

12. To double the size of the city.

13. A city that became three times the size of Glasgow and twice the size of Liverpool, Manchester or Belfast.

14. A century ago Greater Birmingham, a city which began as an idea, became an agenda for action. So bold, so ambitious that it inspired an American journalist to call our city the “best governed city in the world”.

15. So my question today is how does Birmingham once again become the best governed city in the world? How do we win again the world’s attention?

16. Well, let me start by saying that I believe that what is good for Birmingham is good for Britain.
17. So let me answer the question about the future of our city with a view of what’s good for our country.

18. My view is simple. Look ahead and look at the world around us. Over the next 10-20 years the world economy will double in size. Vast new growth markets are opening up for our city, our country, our communities.

19. And if we make the right investments today, we can win a large slice of the one billion skilled jobs that will be created around the world in the two decades ahead. Skilled jobs. With better wages. With wider horizons.

20. And if we make the right investments today we can open up those new jobs to anybody of any colour, any faith, any background if they are prepared to work hard.

21. We can open those new horizons to the many and not the few.

22. And with the wealth that we can create from that endeavour in the years ahead, this city can be renewed, to become a place distinguished not by the stretch of its frontiers – but by the strength of its fabric.

23. This is the progressive opportunity and the progressive challenge for our city.

24. For the truth is that we are, in this city, at a fork in the road.

25. One path takes us to a place where the new wealth of the future is concentrated in the hands of the few. That’s a city of inequality that would dwarf anything we’ve seen to date.

26. But a second path would see us create an economy here in Birmingham with much more “room at the top” – a big new supply of better jobs with better wages,

27. Where it is easier to get on in life, in your profession, in the pursuit of your ambitions, much as we saw in the revolution in social mobility after the Second World War.

28. Where we share some of the wealth we create – to enrich our city and community life. Where we are better able to look after each other. Where we are better able to guarantee that no citizen of the city is left behind.

29. I don’t want to live in a city- and I don’t want to raise my kids in a city- scarred by an irreducible division into “haves, have-nots and have yachts”.

30. I want a city of fair shots. Of fair chances. Where your background, your neighbourhood, or the cards you were dealt at birth do not dictate or determine how far you can rise.

31. I believe passionately that Birmingham can lead Britain in blazing this new trail.

32. Next week the Government will set out our vision of the Britain that emerges from the downturn – of new sources of growth, shared by all sections of society. A renewed national purpose. A new prospectus for the future.

33. How will Birmingham respond?

34. I have said before that part of our problem in our region is that too often we settle for too little; what I once called a malaise of modesty, rather that an attitude of ambition.

35. So, let me ask:

36. Why don’t we take this prospectus and shape from it an aspiration to be the best-governed city in the world?

37. Where would we start? Let me offer three quick suggestions.

Growth

38. Perhaps you will forgive me, as a Treasury minister, for starting with the money.

39. When Lloyd George was prime minister in 1921 he said of this city:

“The Country, the Empire, the world owed to the skill of the engineer, to the industry and the resources of Birmingham, a deep debt of gratitude.”

40. Nearly a hundred years later I believe we could soon hear the same words again.

41. For sure, we have to start by stopping this recession cutting our city deep or long.

42. That’s why I fought so hard to save LDV, and why I will go to every length to see production start once again on Drews Lane.

43. And fighting the recession is easier because it is backed by a government determined not to make again the mistakes of the 1980s and 1990s.

44. In five days time, Birmingham asks for its share of the Government’s £1 billion Future Jobs Fund.

45. You believe up to 5,000 new quality jobs can come.

46. Jobs that could bring in up to £100 million in extra wages each year.

47. Imagine the change that could bring.

48. And on top of that, over £100 million is now online for the city from the Working Neighbourhood Fund to drive still more jobs into constituencies like mine where unemployment remains unacceptably above the national average.

49. But beyond the downturn we have to look to the future.

50. So my call is for Birmingham to lead the way, not lag behind, in opening up the new industries which we know we need to grow our national wealth in the years to come. To rebalance our economy. To offer the jobs of the future; in digital; in Life Sciences; in low carbon.

51. Last week Lord Carter set out our plans for an active industrial policy to accelerate the digital revolution.

52. It offered a vision of new digital networks that could help propel our country to leadership in the creative industries of the digital age.

53. Well, let’s turn vision into reality here.

54. Already, our region is home to an ICT sector with some 41,000 people in 3,000 businesses turning over £4.4 billion.

55. The Digital Birmingham partnership is in place. Our Wi-Fi city centre network is in place.

56. Bloggers like Adrian Goldberg have a national, if not international audience.

57. Good foundations. But our ambitions must be, can be, to become Britain’s leading digital city.

58. Or take Life Sciences. The government has now created the Office of Life Sciences to accelerate the industry’s growth.

59. Well, let’s turn vision into reality here. Our MedTech cluster is home to more than 600 companies turning over £1.1 billion. AWM is backing projects all over the city and all over the region.

60. Good progress. Good foundations. But with the unique advantages we have, universities, world-beating hospitals – how do we become one of the world’s leading cities for life sciences?

61. Or take, low-carbon.

62. The global market for low carbon goods and services today stands at £3 trillion a year and is growing rapidly. Soon the government will set out its strategy for accelerating that market here.

63. Well, let’s turn vision into reality here in Birmingham.

64. Our region’s low carbon economy is already worth £8.4 billion. 4000 firms with over 74,000 staff.

65. And Advantage West Midlands are playing their part with £30 million to drive the shift to low carbon vehicles - and £15 million for research at the region's universities into hydrogen energy and energy efficiency.

66. But we must go further. We should set an ambition to become one of Britain’s first low-carbon cities.

67. So, in the industries of tomorrow it is already clear that we can win.

68. But only if our council, our universities, our hospitals, our regional agencies, our public, private, our not-for-profit sectors, and government all pull together. That is the challenge for us.

Social mobility

69. But my second point is that when- not if- we reach this goal of creating new industries and new jobs, another challenge awaits.

70. We cannot, must not, will not live in a city that creates new wealth that is locked up or locked away from all its citizens.

71. Generations have come to this city to make their fortunes. Men like my great grandfather who fled Communist Russia and came to this city make furnaces for Pilkington – because he heard ‘you can make anything in Birmingham’.

72. It is the hard work of those generations who turned aspiration into success, who helped create the city of today. So how do we salute their efforts tomorrow?

73. Surely by aiming, here in this city, to become the most socially mobile city in Britain.

74. Where, if you want to work hard, you can get on.

75. Where poverty is not a roadblock to aspiration and where aspiration is a fast track out of poverty.

76. But if we want a metropolis that’s mobile, there’s no one great thing you can do. There are lots. And it begins and ends with education.

Education

77. In our nation’s battle for education, this city once led the charge. I believe that we can do so again.

78. It was in Birmingham - in 1869 – that the Education League began.

79. And it was in Birmingham, under the 20 year-long leadership of George Dixon, that the Birmingham School Board became a model for educational authorities everywhere.

80. I believe we have the opportunity to set that standard again.

81. We know that if you want to promote economic mobility then you have to support and invest in families, children and workers at every stage of their lives – from early years, to school, post 16 and at work

82. Now, here in Birmingham, we have the chance to build a new ladder for the city’s citizens, backed by the government.

83. This year comes £54.5 million to develop children’s centres, early years and childcare provision.

84. This year comes £773 million - 3.5 percent up – for our schools. Money that guarantees every young city citizen at least £4,605 - 9 percent more than national average.

85. This year comes £214 million provisionally for Birmingham’s universities- a 4.1 per cent rise on last year.

86. This year comes over £101 million of Train to Gain funding has been invested in the region in the three years since its launch in 2006.

87. Together, even if we just take early years, schools, universities and work-place learning, Birmingham is now a £1 billion plus education capital.

88. Yet, we don’t give all our kids a flying start in life. Our infant mortality rate is almost double the English average.

89. Our exam results are up; 2008 saw record results. But the proportion of Birmingham pupils getting five A*-Cs, including English and Maths, is not only below the national average, we rank 91st out of the Britain’s 150 councils.

90. And 20 of our schools are below the National Challenge floor target of 30 per cent.

91. Surely, with over £1 billion a year, we should set our sights on becoming Britain’s education capital, like we were once before.

92. And in so doing, we must reshape not only our city’s education system, but our system for educating the city.

93. Not education as a one off event that consumes the first quarter of life, but something that stays with us for all of life.

94. Once we built communities around the manor house. Then we built communities around the factory.

95. In the 21st century, communities should be built around the school.

96. In the next decade we have an extraordinary opportunity to do exactly that.

97. We have to find a way of taking down the fences that divide schools from the world around them and the communities on their doorsteps.

98. In the inner city, I often hear teachers say their schools are an oasis. That’s right, they are. But in the future they need to be the communities’ water supply.

99. Last year I held youth conferences in all the schools in my constituency to ask the young people I represent what they wanted to see in our community in the years to come.

100. We have an ambition in Hodge hill to create the best place in Birmingham to be a young person and I wanted young people to tell me what that looked like.

101. But when I asked them their top priority for new investment- you know what they said? ‘Learning a skill’ came top of their poll.

102. It tells us that we’re not yet connecting with young peoples’ ambition in the right way in our classrooms. Our new schools need to change that.

103. Now we are running a programme in our schools backed by the Templeton Foundation. Designed to help develop kids’ understanding, not only of what’s around them. But what’s inside them.

104. And our research tells us, some 80 percent of our youngsters want to go to university. Well above the national average. That tells us that the next generation of Birmingham’s citizens, the people who will lead this city into the mid part of the century, are up for it, they’re ambitious, they could do more.

105. Our children should be our inspiration as we set about this task.

Growth that is shared

106. So this is why I have always said that as city we need to be more ambitious.

107. Because I believe that we can lead the way in creating new industries and new jobs

108. And because I believe we have it within our power to open up those new opportunities to the untapped potential in every ward

109. But, my third point, I don’t believe there is anyone here who wants to live in a city of soulless wealth. We want a city with a wealth of soul.

110. Which is why I say that with the new wealth we can build a new degree of unity in the community - where new growth is shared in a new way that helps make sure that no Birmingham citizen is left behind.

111. So yes, we must grow; yes, we must help people to get on and up. But so too must we use new wealth to create a richer community life.

112. I do not believe that wealth should all disappear into the pockets of the successful. I believe that we should seize the possibilities of the future, and share them.

113. Since I came into politics five years ago, I’ve been a passionate fighter for neighbourhood policing and a tougher fight against anti-social behaviour.

114. Everything I have seen in Hodge Hill tells me this; respect is the ground floor of renewal.

115. And I want to pay tribute this morning to the leadership of Sir Paul Scott-Lee, who here in this city oversaw a plunge in crime by 26.8 per cent over the last 5 years.

116. Now, we must go further.

117. With a new partnership between police, community prosecutors, and the criminal justice system – so that citizens can see justice done; can have a say in how punishment is delivered; can see that if you offend the community, you must payback to the community.

118. I’ve already said that in the future, unlike the past, our success won’t be defined by the stretch of the city’s frontiers.

119. We’ll be judged on the strength of the city’s fabric.

120. And if we want to use new success to strengthen the city fabric, we have to start with the city’s homes. Communities aren’t empty ideas. Communities are made of people and families.

121. And families need homes. Homes are the building blocks of a community that is stronger in the years to come.

122. And a century ago, we were leaders. We should be leaders again.

123. It was Birmingham, that helped invent the town-planning movement.

124. Pioneers like the Cadburys in Bournville, created model homes, separate gardens, wide roads.

125. The Melbourne Age in 1910 wrote that “Bournville is as important to England as a dreadnought.”

126. So let’s be pioneers in creating strong communities again.

127. Birmingham City Council have consulted on options to deliver between 50,000 and 65,000 new homes in the City by 2026.

128. I simply point out these houses will not meet the projected demand: 87,000 new households are projected to form in Birmingham by 2026.

129. So Birmingham needs to raise its ambition and set out how it will play its part in meeting Britain’s housing challenges, even given the pressures of the financial downturn.

130. But let’s build these homes around public services.

Conclusion

131. So here are some first thoughts, about how we can once again aspire to be the best governed city in the world.

132. We once set the national standard. We should seek to do that again.

133. But, when you look at challenge after challenge, opportunity after opportunity, one theme stands.

134. No-one can do this alone. There is no lone gun, no single force that is master of this agenda and which will deliver it for the people of this city.

135. Only by acting in concert will we make progress. And here we must step up the pace in every part of this city.

136. If you will forgive me for saying so, five years as a community organiser in East Birmingham has taught me that we spend too long in the city talking about structures and too little talking about action.

137. We have to get the barriers to working together out the way.

138. So at the Treasury I will be championing the 'Total Place' strategy that will, in cities like Birmingham, knock down walls between you.

139. But, in parts of our city, like East Birmingham, we have to dramatically raise our game. Here in one place, across an urban area the size of Manchester, we have four of the most unemployed constituencies in the country.

140. For five years I feel I’ve been talking about the prospects of the East Birmingham corridor. Yet, progress is nothing like visible enough.

141. Let me tell you straight.

142. If we are not able to transform – I mean literally transform – the speed with which we deliver change in major parts of our city, home to hundreds of thousands of our residents, then we will be simply overtaken, outpaced and out-gunned by cities that are more agile.

143. So, I will be testing the market for a new East Birmingham alliance that brings together politicians, business, the not for profit sector and our public servants to challenge the speed of change.

144. When I look around this room this morning, I see some of the best public servants in the country.

145. In four years as a Minister, I have relentlessly travelled around Britain, meeting people from all walks of life, all parts of public life.

146. You are amongst the best. That’s why I say this to you today: seize the future, as we did a century ago.

147. Seize the future, because it’s there to be taken.