The Future of Britain’s Cities

The intellectual highlight of the TRG’s conference programme is taking place as I write.

Lord Heseltine, Steve Norris and Tony Hawkhead of Groundwork together with Mike Whitby, leader of Birmingham City Council, are the plan discussing the Future of Britain’s Cities.

Call me biased of you want, but I am sure that their coments so far have already made this the most meaty and policy-focused event so far this year. More on those ideas later.

In the meantime, the discussion is being filmed so we will hope to make this available to you all as soon as we can.

First Thoughts on Birmingham

So for the first time in three-quarters of a century, a major UK political party is holding its annual conference in Birmingham. The early signs are positive. The city actually seems to have the capacity to take a conference of this size and unlike certain seaside towns that begin with “B”, there are places to go and eat outside of the main venue once the business of the day is done.

Now, we just need to sort out the ridiculous price of hotel rooms here!