LEADER s BUSINESS RECEPTION 2014 REPORT. The Great Hospital on 27 November Font: Humanist

Transcription

1 LEADER s BUSINESS RECEPTION 2014 REPORT The Great Hospital on 27 November 2014 Font: Humanist

2 The main theme of the 2014 Leader s Business Reception was digital connectivity. The business reception began with a welcome by the leader of Norwich City Council, Councillor Brenda Arthur, who set the scene describing the local economy and highlighting that good connectivity can be a vital catalyst for growth in both urban and rural areas. Cllr Arthur s welcome was followed by Annette Thorpe (BT Group) and Karen O Kane (Norfolk County Council) whose presentation focused on the availability and types of broadband accessible to businesses in Norwich. More information can be found at The second presentation of the evening was delivered by Harry Harold from NeonTribe, a web development company. Harry gave a lively talk about social media how it has helped his own business and how other small businesses are using it to their advantage. Details of Harry s work can be found at The final presentation, by Stefan Gurney (Norwich BID) and Paul McCarthy (intu Chapelfield), centred on a new free Wi-Fi network for the city centre, which is currently being rolled out. The free Wi-Fi will enhance the city s retail offer and provide commercial opportunities for city centre retailers. The project will launch fully in early 2015; up-to-date information relating to the project will be made available at The presentations were followed by a brief question and answer session. As usual, the reception concluded with round table discussions an opportunity to make sure that Norwich City Council councillors and staff hear the views of the Norwich business community. Key points raised during the discussions are summarised in the following pages.

3 Round table discussions specific questions A number of business people were unclear as to what Norwich BID is and what it has done. Established in November 2012, the Norwich Business Improvement District (BID) is an organisation run for local businesses by local businesses. Norwich BID covers a defined area of the city where the team works to improve the trading environment and identifies additional projects and services that develop the city centre. Norwich BID will raise 3m over its five-year term through an annual one per cent levy on the rateable value of business premises over 15,000 within the BID area. More information and contact details can be found at Anglia Square can this be sorted out please? Please make sure planning is a smooth process and that development can take place. The continued condition of Anglia Square is a source of huge frustration to the city council and considerable time and effort has been invested in the site. This has included working closely with the county council and the previous owners to put in place a robust planning framework (through an area action plan); releasing two planning consents for the comprehensive redevelopment of the site, and delivering the new St Augustine s gyratory road to improve access to Anglia Square and improve conditions on St Augustine s Street. The plans for comprehensive redevelopment never came to fruition and the site was effectively taken into administration. Thankfully, it was sold to Threadneedle Properties early in To date, Threadneedle has been assessing the asset and looking at development possibilities. The council has met with them on a number of occasions and continues to assist them. It is hoped they will be in a position to consult on initial proposals at the beginning of In the meantime, the council will continue to do what it can to improve the environment of the area. This includes delivering improvements to Magdalen Street as part of the city cycle ambition grant project, Push the Pedalways. This work is scheduled for January 2015.

4 Many businesses don t understand why they haven t got faster broadband. Why has it taken so long to get high speed broadband in the city? Businesses also reported that getting information on how to get connected and when is incredibly difficult. Norwich has two fibre infrastructure providers, BT Openreach and Virgin Media. The links that follow provide information relating to the availability of broadband infrastructure at any particular property and information on available speeds. Virgin Media BT Openreach Information about how to get superfast broadband is available for Virgin Media via the website link given above. Many different internet service providers (ISPs) use BT Openreach infrastructure to provide services. The OFCOM website provides a number of comparison websites, which show the broadband packages available form a range of providers. Click here to visit the page. In some areas, businesses will only have access to superfast broadband via Virgin Media. This is because, if Virgin Media serves your property, European Union State Aid rules prevent the Better Broadband for Norfolk programme from applying any public subsidy. Therefore BT Openreach will decide whether or not a business case exists for commercial investment. It may be that in a particular area of the city, superfast broadband is not currently available from any provider. If this is the case, from early 2015, use the Better Broadband for Norfolk website to see if an upgrade is planned in your postcode area: Businesses said that there was a lack of awareness of the free Wi-Fi project. As Stefan Gurney said in his presentation, the formal launch of the free Wi-Fi in Norwich s city centre is planned for early in The evening s presentation was to inform businesses that it was taking place the Wi-Fi network is not yet fully functional. European money is coming into the area but what is it being used for? European funding programmes are wide in both their number and diversity. Information relating to European funding can be found at and on the European funding page at

5 Round table discussions - key points Norwich BID free Wi-Fi project Businesses were generally positive about the proposed project. The promotion and marketing of the free Wi-Fi was discussed. Suggestions included banners at the railway station and the airport and use of social media. Digital connectivity Delegates suggested that there was a problem with broadband speeds and availability on many of the city s industrial estates. The importance of good digital access was felt to be above that of transport for many sectors. Some businesses felt that there was a risk that the city would become a Wi-Fi/broadband island in the county and that businesses would be attracted away from rural areas into the city. Digital inclusion was not seen as a particular issue by delegates. City centre office space Some businesses had previously moved out of the city centre to out-of-town business parks but now wanted to move back as it was a more conducive working environment for staff. Discussion took place around a perceived gap in the market for smaller, high-spec office accommodation in the city centre, similar to that found in Cambridge e.g. serviced offices such as Regus (note: a number of providers already offer serviced offices in Norwich). It was acknowledged that out-of-town business parks have an advantage in that they offer free parking. Marketing the city of Norwich The need for a coherent voice in marketing the city was discussed. The current approach was felt to be piecemeal involving a variety of agencies (the universities (UEA and NUA), Norwich Research Park, Writers Centre Norwich, Norwich BID etc). To compete with the large metropolitan areas, the city should promote itself within a regional context, alongside Cambridge, Colchester etc. Park & Ride Issues were raised relating to the evening and weekend operating times at P&R sites. Dialogue between the P&R operator and Norwich BID should be encouraged. Car parks It was suggested that real-time car park information could be disseminated via twitter. Delegates also expressed dissatisfaction with the system of combined day and evening car park tariffs.

6 Event evaluation Approximately 50 per cent of delegates completed an event evaluation. Respondents were asked to rate the following aspects of the event on a scale from 1 (very poor) to 5 (very good). The findings are summarised in Figure 1 below. Figure 1 70% Evaluation of Leader s business reception 60% 1 very poor very good 50% % of respondents 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Venue Catering Presentations Table discussions Overall event Venue: 97 per cent of respondents rated the venue as good/very good Catering: 75 per cent of respondents rated the catering as good/very good, the remainder rated it as average. Presentations: 61 per cent rated the presentations as good/very good, 39 per cent rated them average. Round table discussions: 90 per cent of respondents rated the discussions as good/very good and the remainder rated the them as average. Overall event rating: 93 per cent rated the event as good/very good, 7 per cent rated it as average. Event recommendation: 100 per cent of respondents will recommend the event to other colleagues. DPP 10031