0:04 – 0:51

Everybody’s starting to talk about how we’re actually going to spend that £725 billion that was in the infrastructure strategy. They’re talking about the rail that they’re going to build, they’re talking about the houses that they’re going to build, and they’re talking about how they can make innovation part of that and benefit the UK in terms of jobs and growth. The demand and the desire by regions and places for business growth is growing exponentially. We’re seeing that regions really want businesses to create the conditions to help them grow, to help them accelerate and help them innovate, get new buyers, and that’s really exciting to see. The most interesting is the knowledge sessions that I’ve been into and the way they’ve been talking about transport, not just as an economic opportunity for the UK as a whole and the infrastructure that we have to deliver, but the real social value that they deliver into our communities.

0:51 – 1:25

So we absolutely have to get transport infrastructure right for the health, the well being, the inclusion of all our communities, towns and cities. Investors are telling me they’ve got capital ready to flow. Infrastructure developers are really struggling to generate the confidence from those capital investors to invest into their pipelines. What’s clear to me when I get back to the office, I’m really going to double down on bringing those two sides of the equation together so we can genuinely make infrastructure happen. Business growth is the heart of what many people are trying to do and they’re looking for ways of really accelerating businesses into their places, and we’re at the heart of those plans.

1:26 – 1:31

For me, what I’m taking away is how we connect the SMEs that we support to that infrastructure spend that’s coming.