This month Ian Mean MBE has written the next in our Director blog series. This time Ian shares his personal thoughts about how closely intertwined the work of businesses and politicians are, and how they should work together for a better future.
Business needs the help of our councillors and those councillors must be prepared to support their local businesses.
This is especially the case with a lot of political change in our district councils in Gloucestershire and also with our new MPs.
Councillors do get a lot of flak. It’s an unforgiving job that, in my view, is not properly recognised.
My theme of councillor support and recognition comes after the announcement by Councillor Mark Hawthorne, Leader of Gloucestershire County Council, that he is stepping down from the role after 14 years and is leaving politics.
We cannot afford to lose strong local political leaders like Mark, who I have known for over 20 years, and in my view , would have made a good MP.
Putting politics aside, I have found councillors who do the job just want to put something back into the local communities which elect them.
Talking to Mark Hawthorne about his decision to quit politics, I thought about the contribution he had made to local business in Gloucestershire.
He was instrumental in keeping the campaign to develop the A417 “Missing Link” road alive over many years. Mark’s lobbying in Whitehall to ensure the government’s half a billion pounds funding was very valuable.
There were many naysayers on the project who said it wouldn’t get funding—Mark and the county council proved them wrong.
This road scheme will be a game changer for Gloucestershire-especially for business whose transportation is held up by the chaos on the current road system around Crickley Hill.
And another game changer was Mark’s involvement as Leader of Gloucester City Council in setting up the Gloucester Heritage Urban Regeneration Company that helped to transform the city’s Docks and enabled Gloucester Quays to be built.
Business needs to realise the value of our councillors in Gloucestershire, whatever their political persuasion. They can often make a company’s idea and investment come to fruition.
It just means working together for growth.
