Crowe Clark Whitehill calls for a Black Country industrial bank

THE Black Country needs its own industrial bank if economic growth is to be achieved, a leading professional has claimed.

Johnathan Dudley, Midlands managing partner at accountancy firm Crowe Clark Whitehill, said liquidity problems following the 2007/08 banking crisis are still hampering companies almost five years on.

“More cash-flow lending for manufacturers is needed. In the present circumstances, with no sign of things changing, this means that a big initiative is required – an industrial bank,” he said.

“Such a bank has been suggested at a national level, with Warwick Manufacturing Group’s founder Lord Kumar Bhattacharyya lobbying ministers and raising the matter in the House of Lords.

“This could, and arguably should, be sited in the West Midlands, the heart of the manufacturing industry, although a big campaign would be needed to persuade the Government that this is the way forward.”

Dudley suggests that government incentives to banks have just enabled banks to lend what they were already going to lend on ‘copper-bottomed proposals’, but more cheaply and that more marginal propositions still aren’t getting a look in.

“Manufacturers and exporters need a ready source of finance at reasonable rates that they can rely on in challenging times. An industrial bank could deliver where mainstream banks have failed,” he said.