Leeds City Region Week: Boris Johnson hails region’s positives

LEADING delegates from the Leeds City Region have pledged to target investment from China and India as London Mayor Boris Johnson hailed Yorkshire’s advantages at international property conference MIPIM.

Accompanied by the Prime Minister of Rwanda and the Mayor of Cannes, Mr Johnson visited the Leeds City Region stand and discussed the benefits a new high speed rail line connecting Yorkshire to London would bring to the region.

Mr Johnson also discussed Leeds’s role as the biggest financial services sector outside London with Marketing Leeds chief executive Deborah Green and Jean Dent, the former city development director of Leeds City Council, who is representing Leeds City Region as an ambassador at MIPIM.

The Mayor said: “Leeds and London have obvious synergies in terms of being major financial and legal centres in the UK and have a key role to play in promoting UK plc on the international stage.

“I look forward to exploring how we can work together to drive growth and prosperity in future.”

Speaking to TheBusinessDesk.com, Ms Dent said the meeting with Mr Johnson, who is at the conference in Cannes as a key UK delegate, had been positive and showed that the city region was being taken seriously as a major centre for growth.

Ms Dent said: “We talked about an integrated transport structure for the Leeds City Region. We also discussed the importance of the strategic location of Leeds in the UK as it sits right in the middle between London and Edinburgh.”

Meanwhile, Ms Green said the delegation of business leaders who have travelled to MIPIM from the Leeds City Region would be targeting potential investors in the Far East and Asia.

She said the team had already had early successes, with a number of meetings with Chinese delegates being held to discuss the development opportunities in Leeds and across Yorkshire.

Ms Dent added: “There’s significant investment money available from places such as China and they’re looking for opportunities to invest.

“We have to capitalise and make the most out of these opportunities.”

 She said property investors would be looking for “safe havens” and that regions such as Yorkshire offered opportunities as confidence is weakened in territories such as the Middle East.

Ms Green added: “We are distinctively different from other locations and can offer something unique.”

Ms Dent defended the ‘city region’ model and said locations such as Paris were using the same approach.

And she added: “We also come to MIPIM to support Leeds businesses. We’re here to support businesses doing business and that’s important.”