Liverpool welcomes London's Lord Mayor for the day

LJMU and the city of Liverpool welcomed the Lord Mayor of London this week as he toured the region to back a major growth strategy and new vision for the city region.

The Lord Mayor, Alderman the Lord Mountevans, met with officials from the University and business leaders in the city region as part of a visit organised by Professional Liverpool and Liverpool in London. 

Visiting Liverpool Science Park (LSP), the new home for the Sensor City project team ahead of the official site opening on Copperas Hill in July 2017, the Lord Mayor had the opportunity to hear about the progress being made on the hi-tech sensors technology centre - a collaborative venture involving LJMU and the University of Liverpool.

Joanne Phoenix, from Sensor City, commented on the visit: "Given the international liaison and promotional work undertaken by the Lord Mayor of London, Professional Liverpool provided us with an excellent opportunity to raise awareness of Sensor City and our aims for the development of a global hub for sensor technologies.  Although we have clear targets for the regional economy, our aims are national and international in scope, and it is important that we raise awareness of our activity and that Sensor City can become part of the UK Plc market offering." 

During his trip, the Lord Mayor also got the opportunity to see current Maritime projects, before visiting Unilever’s £6.9m formulation laboratories at LSP. He also toured the £300m Liverpool 2 project and heard about the £5.5bn Liverpool Waters scheme. 

Speaking about his visit, the Lord Mayor said: “As a financial centre of excellence, Liverpool’s professional sector is a vital asset and plays a key role in contributing to the UK’s growth as a whole. It is important for us at the City of London to continue to work closely with the regions to drive future growth and job creation. 

“Liverpool hosts more than 45,000 workers in the financial, insurance, and professional services sectors, and I am keen to explore how the City of London can help in creating more top quality jobs like these across the country.

“We are engaging with the Government and EU policy makers to ensure that the interests and competitiveness needs of the UK-based financial and professional services industry are heard and recognised.”

Lord Mountevans, the 688th incumbent of a role that dates back centuries, showed his support for the Liverpool City Region growth strategy ‘Building our Future’ which aims to deliver an extra 100,000 jobs over the next 25 years. 

His visit culminated with a tour the new Exhibition Centre Liverpool before attending a private dinner with representatives from Liverpool City Council, the Local Enterprise Partnership, Liverpool Chamber of Commerce, local universities, and businesses. He will also hear from Liverpool Vision chief executive Max Steinberg on the success of the recent International Festival for Business.

Professional Liverpool chief executive John Hall said: “Having strong connections with the City of London is of crucial importance to the success of Liverpool’s professionals sector. It is through this continued dialogue that we can build on the sector and work together to tackle issues such as historic skills gaps and bring them to the forefront of political discussions.

“In what is an uncertain political environment, we need to join forces to nurture and grow our talent base and create more sustainable employment and high value jobs. With the backing of the City of London, Liverpool can continue to build on its strengths and strive to be one of the finest professional and financial services sectors possible.”

Financial and professional services are identified as growth sectors in the report by the Liverpool City Region Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP). It states the vision for Liverpool is to become a competitive and attractive alternative regional complement to London based financial and professional services businesses.

The city region employs more than 45,000 people in the sector and represents the third largest wealth management industry in the UK. 

Photograph: Left to right, Simon Holgate, CEO, Sea Level Research, John Hall, chief executive of Professional Liverpool, the Lord Mayor of London, Alderman the Lord Mountevans and Bernard Molloy, chair of Superport, at Liverpool Science Park.