Comment

Northern Ireland’s economic potential highlighted at major summit – but we must improve our planning system to realise our growth potential

Last week the UK Government welcomed over 100 international investors to Northern Ireland for a summit to showcase the region’s most innovative businesses and start-ups.

Senior Strategic Communications Consultant, Jack Gibson provides his thoughts on the outcomes of the summit.

Organised by the Department for Business and Trade and the Northern Ireland Office, it effectively acted as a storefront for Northern Ireland, seeking to woo global business to invest or reinvest.

The mood music was good from the outset, with EY announcing the creation of around 1,000 new jobs in Northern Ireland over the next five years in tech-focused areas like cyber-security and data analytics. Speakers like Secretary of State for Business and Trade Kemi Badenoch MP went on to extoll the virtues of the region’s unique trading position, both within the single market and the UK internal market.

Other luminaries involved in the effort to drum up investment in Northern Ireland included the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Chris Heaton-Harris MP, The Princess Royal and US Special Envoy for Northern Ireland, Joe Kennedy III.

As was highlighted by the Northern Ireland Business Alliance, the positive positioning of Northern Ireland’s economic offer isn’t without foundation. Northern Ireland really does have unique selling points to investors, both as a ‘gateway to two of the world’s largest markets’ and because of its ‘success in advanced manufacturing, finance and professional services, fintech, cyber, health and life sciences, aerospace, engineering, agrifood and creative and digital industries.’

However, amidst the positivity, there were a few notes of caution. 

Firstly, and most obviously, the continued lack of a functioning Executive put a dampener on proceedings. Northern Ireland Executive Ministers would ordinarily have been expected to play a starring role in proceedings, however as Chris Heaton-Harris observed, ‘sadly, this has not proven to be the case.’

This isn’t just a missed opportunity for politicians to have a ‘grip-and-grin’ with major investors. The continuing lack of an Executive is doubtlessly damaging investor confidence in Northern Ireland.

Pertinently, it’s now over a year and a half since the Northern Ireland’s Audit Office said that Northern Ireland’s planning system – vital to attract investment in the region – was “in many aspects […] failing to deliver for the economy, communities or the environment”. This was followed by similar concerns raised by all parties on the Northern Ireland Assembly’s Public Accounts and Infrastructure Committees who underlined that “strategic changes… are needed to make the system fit for purpose”. If you’re an investor seeking to invest in a place, city or region, you want as much certainty as possible that you will start to see a return swiftly.

Investors need certainty on planning timelines and performance, and currently see a place where the planning process consumes vast swathes of valuable time, and where the reasons for delays in application determinations are opaque or difficult to predict. We know the system acts as a barrier to investment, but the continuing stalemate in the Executive and the constraints on departmental and local Government budgets means that we’re unable to do anything about it.

For all the worth of the Investment Summit, the best stimulant for investment is confidence.

Take the EY announcement of 1,000 new jobs as an example. Those 1,000 jobs will bring more workers into our cities and our climate ambitions means there’s a strategic imperative to house them close to the city centre.

The same week that EY made its announcement, ground was broken on the Loft Lines development, a £175m investment by Legal & General in a 778-home Build-to-Rent apartment development in Titanic Quarter designed with precisely the same sort of people in mind as EY intend to employ. Each announcement, therefore, helps create the conditions for the success of the other.

This symbiotic relationship is entirely typical. No investment takes place in a vacuum and, if we are to achieve the vision of a modern, urban-focused, climate-conscious society outlined in policy documents like the Belfast Agenda, we need to keep the investment pipeline primed.

The Investment Summit, and events like it, are good ideas. They will help to keep money flowing into Northern Ireland, improving living standards and helping us to achieve our ambitions for the place.

But they can’t replace the value of good, consistent policymaking and leadership from our Executive. Improvement to our planning system is not as flashy or glamourous as Summits attended by world leaders and the scions of political dynasties – but it’s what we desperately need to build investor confidence.

For more information please get in touch with Jack Gibson.

22 September 2023