David Parkin bids goodbye to Leeds and Partners and surveys his share portfolio

I thought Leeds City Council might sweep the city marketing organisation under the carpet after the departure of its chief executive Lurene Joseph next year.

But this week it announced the results of a review chaired by council leader Keith Wakefield that recommend that the inward investment and marketing work of the organisation should be transferred to the Local Enterprise Partnership because of the recognition that there needs to be a regional approach to this going forward.

The announcement said that Leeds and Partners had “transformed” the way that Leeds and the city region attract inward investment.

I wonder if it could have perhaps done a slightly better job had Lurene Joseph not spent much of her almost three years in charge stumbling from one personal PR disaster to another?

I compared the organisation’s cock-eyed view of itself as akin to North Korea when it was announced a couple of month’s ago that Joseph was leaving.

Surely it couldn’t try and spin the news of its demise as a positive?

The organisation is chaired by Andy Clarke, who runs Asda, one of Britain’s four big supermarkets.

It appears that when it comes to non-executive roles he is about as much use as Allan Leighton was as deputy chairman of Leeds United when “chairman” Peter Ridsdale was let loose in the sweet shop.

This was Clarke’s statement this week when the news was announced that Leeds and Partners is to disappear. 

I’ve put my interpretation of the words in brackets after them.

“The board and chief executive of Leeds and Partners whole heartedly support this move to a regional agenda, which will realise the significant opportunities that closer alignment will bring for the Leeds City Region economy.”

(The council have told us they are binning us off and given the chief exec is doing a runner for pastures new we are happy to accept this fait accompli.)

“In the last three years Leeds and Partners has transformed the way the city and wider region attract inward investment.”

(Please don’t ask us to justify the use of the word transform because we can’t but we like it because it sounds quite positive.)

“It is testament to the achievements and talent of the team that the West Yorkshire Combined Authority and LEP recognise the successes of Leeds and Partners and intend to build on this approach as part of the new governance structure.”

(That’s what they’ve told us and we are sticking with it.)

“I look forward to continuing to play an active role in supporting this agenda moving forward.” (Phew, I’m glad to be out of this mess and that’ll teach me to get involved in stuff I don’t know about. I’m sticking to supermarkets in future, which is hard enough.”

After I was so critical in October, and given I’m a bit of a softie and like being liked, I spent a lot of time trying to find people who thought Lurene Joseph had done a good job.

And I have found a couple of major figures in the Leeds property community who spoke out in her favour and said she’d done a decent job promoting the city’s property sector.

Mind you, apparently after she had announced her resignation she turned up at a meeting of people from the city’s property community and told them that given her impending departure she was now able to speak out and tell people exactly what she thought.

“Ten minutes later we didn’t have a clue what she was saying,” said my property contact.

You’d have thought it would have been best for all concerned if Leeds and Partners just accepted the decision and let it happen quietly. Trying to justify its demise is a bit like a condemned man tap dancing on the platform when they’ve just put the noose around his neck.

Deluded is how I would describe anyone who attempts to argue that Leeds and Partners has done a great job of marketing the city and attracting inward investment.

The organisation employs some good people, it is backed by a good city council and good businesses. But it has handicapped itself by sticking with a chief executive who was its biggest liability.

The fact that those involved in it and around it didn’t recognise that – or knew it and didn’t act – is justification enough that Leeds and Partners should be no more.

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A LETTER arrived this week from Interactive Investor about my “share portfolio”. 

Now given my stock market holdings amount to shares in a privatised high street bank and the debt-ridden basket case that is regional newspaper publisher Johnston Press, I think calling it a portfolio is stretching things a bit.

A five-year-old has more value in their piggy bank.

Perhaps that explains why, having put my shares into an online account with Interactive Investor (known as iii) years ago, I haven’t monitored their progress with great enthusiasm.

It seems the debit card with which I paid their quarterly fees has expired and I haven’t updated the details.

I received a similar letter several weeks ago which threatened to sell some of my shares to pay the outstanding amount should I not update the card details.

I called the company, spoke to someone and asked why I was getting such a threat out of the blue. It seems their normal approach to communication is to send messages to a customer’s online account.

I hadn’t seen them because I literally hadn’t logged in for years. (You don’t tend to when, as a loyal employee, you buy shares in Johnston Press at 279p and then watch them fall to 5p. They’ve since done a consolidation of shares which makes they look more valuable but in reality is like putting a silk hat on a pig.)

Anyway, I eventually logged on to my account, updated the debit card details and left it at that.

Anyway, the letter arrived this week saying they hadn’t heard from me and had sold shares to cover the amount.

What a shabby approach. Given the debt was about 40 quid I think that will have swallowed up the value of my existing JP shares.

I’m already talking to another firm about transferring whatever is left to them.

And I might even add to my “portfolio”. 

Mind you, given my investment history, I might just pop into that bookies by the entrance to Leeds Station instead.