Week Ending: Mayor Joe and the Tory leaders; Bill Holmes’ day in the life & ‘Tips’ on tour in Brazil

PART of a mayor’s job is to be the figurehead of a city, and Liverpool’s mayor Joe Anderson is certainly getting noticed by senior politicians.

Earlier in the month at the IFB launch David Cameron cracked a gag by telling Anderson that no one would accuse him of being a sycophant.

This week it was the turn of George Osborne. The chancellor was in Manchester to make his “Northern powerhouses” speech which resurrected the notion of city mayors. Osborne was offering more devolved powers to those cities willing to embrace a London-style mayoral system.

But the speech was light on detail which left Mayor Joe asking what incentives would be on offer to attract cities down this route. Just as he started speaking the fire alarm went off.

“I didn’t press the alarm,” quipped Osborne.

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BILL Holmes, the founder of Crewe’s Radius Payment Solutions, a fuel card business previously known as UK Fuels, picked up EY’s northern Entrepreneur of the Year award on Tuesday. Accepting his award he paid tribute to his friend and business partner John Atkinson who died last year. But he eschewed the usual reflection on his journey to the top. Instead he decided to tell the audience what a slog business can be sometimes.

He told of a trip to Paris the day before. “I told my daughter I was going to Paris, she thinks it’s all glamorous – a trip to the Eiffel Tower, then Sacre Coeur and a wander around. I got up at 4am to get to the airport for the 6.10am.

“There was a strike going on, France is a tough place to do business, so at passport control I had an hour’s wait. I got on the RER (the Paris underground) which was sweaty and hot, and met my Belgian friend. But then we got on the wrong train, and we were already late. We travelled back and got off at the station. He said the office we were going to was 500 metres away, but it was 3km! We got there 45 minutes late and I was soaking. I went in thinking there was a 10% chance of winning the business, and came out thinking there was maybe a 30% chance, which isn’t bad.

“I then got a taxi to Gare Du Nord, a train to Lille to look around potential offices, then caught the train back to St Pancras. Walked to Euston where my train was late so I missed the connection at Crewe to Hartford. I got home at 11pm. So it’s not all glamour, but it is satisfying. I hope you enjoyed that.”

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ENGLAND’S underperforming World Cup team may have made an early return from Brazil, but one notable Manchester financier is still “having it large” there.

Gary Tipper, the boss of Palatine Private Equity, is enjoying a well-earned break in Brazil, and is keeping his Twitter followers updated with ‘selfies’ in a range of glamourous locations from Rio sports bars to beach restaurants.

Judging by the quality of some of the pundits on our TV screens during the World Cup, his pithy analysis could earn him a call-up from BBC and ITV.

He writes: “Oh well, started and ended with a whimper on the footy front, but what an experience being here to soak it all up, been brilliant, despite the footy.”