On Thursday 4th May, in just a few days’ time, our region, the West Midlands, goes to the polls to choose (for the first time ever) a Mayor .
This is our chance, at last, to choose someone to lead around five million people through the challenges and opportunities presented by this, Asia’s Century, over the next few decades.
Scotland, London, Manchester - you name it, they’ve all stolen a march on us over the past few years. But now we have the chance to put this right.
We can now elect our own Leader/Ambassador, fighting our corner and banging the drum every day and in every way in Westminster and Whitehall, and in Dubai, Mumbai and Shanghai (not to mention San Francisco, São Paulo and Sydney!).
This is NOT the General Election. This is nothing to do with who you want to run the country.
Our new Mayor must NOT be a professional party politician but someone from the right sort of business, from our region, someone who allows local authorities to get on with doing what local councils do and not interfering, not getting mired in the party politics of it all.
Someone who is at ease in the Corridors of Power, in the boardrooms of would-be investing businesses around the globe, someone at ease with all types of media, someone who will be taken seriously to promote creating socially-inclusive wealth, stimulating successful business to make profits which generate tax which builds schools and hospitals, providing the opportunities for thousands of new jobs but someone who cares, who personally experiences the need for meaningful diversity and zero discrimination every day.
That person is Andy Street.
Someone who puts people first and party politics last.
We are NOT electing a local authority boss. We do NOT want someone who is a career politician, we do NOT need a party apparatchik, looking inward to greasing the wheels of the party apparatus and giving meaning to buggins turn.
I wish there were no party politics in this election; I care so much for my home region that I want this wonderful opportunity to be taken by the right person for the job and not “the bloke from Labour just cos I always vote Labour” or “the Tory chap just because he’s a Tory”. Surely we can do better than that?
Surely our individual votes mean more than that! This is NOT -repeat NOT- the party political General Election.
We should look at our choice on the merits of the individual to do the job, not the politics.
I don’t do party politics, I have been an independent all my life; even when I was a Government Minister I didn’t join the party of government. I am going to make my choice on who I believe will be best to do the new Mayor’s job for the good of us all; his party allegiance is an irrelevance.
So it comes down to a choice between two people frankly. I say that with great respect to all the candidates in the election; good people with honestly held beliefs who are definitely worth a hearing; please respect them all - that is what our democracy is all about.
But let’s face it: our first Mayor will be either Sion Simon or Andy Street; which of those two should it be? Who will do the job, this new job, this non-tribal job, this global job, this make-a-good-impression job, this “I am not a local politico” job better?
Sion Simon has been a freelance journalist and consultant. Yes that counts as the “self-employed” person he claims he’s been for over a decade, but does this really equip a future Mayor to understand running a small firm? That’s not really a small business as most people understand the term. A bit of a stretch isn’t it Sion?
Sion Simon was a junior minister for two years and oversaw departmental sponsorship of the Learning and Skills Council and its £11 billion budget. But it had its own CEO to run it and manage the cash.
He says he had “overall responsibility for an £11 billion organisation”. I’ve been a junior minister of a large organisation (UKTI) which spent a lot of taxpayers’ money; my CEO ran it and was accountable for the budget. I took Parliamentary responsibility of course but that is not the same as being in charge of it. A bit of a stretch isn’t it Sion?
Sion Simon says he was “a senior manager in a global organisation”. He was employed by Guinness in his twenties for a couple of years, before heading off into a party political career. Experienced in business? A bit of a stretch isn’t it Sion?
Sion Simon has been a career politician for some thirty years. That is a worthy pursuit and whether at local, national or European level, he has participated in government and politics to further his properly-held beliefs on how our country and beyond should be run.
But NONE of that equips Sion Simon to do this job, the Mayor of the West Midlands job. His experience equips him to do lots of things - but not being our Leader/Ambassador around the World, confidently doing deals where it matters, where first impressions count, where proper business experience, proper Boardroom experience, will define success or failure.
This job, this position that we are electing someone to fulfil, is far too important, far too serious, far too vital for the life success of millions to have it done by someone who needs to learn on the job, who does not hold the confidence of the business community, who will not be equipped to take the fight to those whose decisions will affect us all, be they politicians or business leaders.
We do not need someone whose party defines success as spending other people’s money.
Andy Street has all the right qualities to do the job for the good of every voter in the West Midlands and her or his family. I can see him in those Boardrooms, in those important meetings, doing deals with those who hold the purse strings and make the rules.
He’s local, he’s been boss of the John Lewis Partnership (the right type of business in my book, a company with the right set of social values where the employees are the owners) and he is a fresh face, untrammelled by the eroding influence of the pork-barrelling that is party politics.
You have a chance on 4th May to do something that will finally put our Region on the global map by electing someone on merit, on suitability to the job in hand, on being fit for purpose in a changed world - or you can succumb to the old-fashioned electoral ways of voting along party lines regardless of whether the person is right for the job or not.
For the good of the next generation, for the sake of your grandchildren, let’s go with ability not party, vote for the right person - Andy Street - and let’s give Scotland, Manchester and London something and someone to worry about and the rest of the world someone of whom they will sit up and take notice!
- Lord (Digby) Jones of Birmingham was Director General of the Confederation of British Industry from 2000 to 2006 and Minister of State for Trade and Investment from 2007 to 2008. He served on the Commission for Racial Equality for several years and on many West Midlands charities. He is Chairman of many businesses and organisations based in the West Midlands.
