Chamber News

The May unemployment figures across Norfolk followed the trend of the rest of the UK and fell slightly. The county showed an overall reduction of 3.6%. Unemployment rates in Norfolk have been falling noticeably since February 2013, however, despite this drop, there are still over 17,000 unemployment claimants in Norfolk.

The latest report shows that 26% of the claimants in our region are aged between 18 and 24 years old and the national percentage is only slightly lower at 25.9%. Norwich has the largest number of claimants between 16 and 64 years old, with just under 4,400 and Great Yarmouth has over 3,500 claimants. The Norwich figure dropped by 2%, whilst Great Yarmouth dropped by 3.2%. This still leaves Great Yarmouth in 13th place on the unemployment tables for the English Local Authorities, of which there are fifty local authorities, whilst Norwich is listed in 45th place.

Norwich City Council have released their latest economic barometer for the region. Some of the highlights are:

• New data suggests that the UK’s services sector, which accounts for around three-quarters of the economy, grew at its fastest rate since March 2012.
• Norfolk’s hard-hit construction industry may be over the worst of the downturn according to recent figures.
• Start-up businesses across Norfolk and Suffolk could have access to millions of pounds of funds to get them off the ground with the launch of a new initiative.
• Norfolk and Suffolk are to get greater decision making power from government over transport schemes. The two counties will receive £39 million for the four years from April 2015, to be spent on transport schemes costing more than £5 million.
• Norwich-based engineering firm, Tyco Fire & Integrated Solutions, is celebrating a landmark £5 million deal with a Chinese energy company which is equal to a third of its turnover.
• Average house prices in Norfolk grew by 1.1%, making the average house price £144,227 in Norfolk.

Full details of all the above can be found in the attached Norwich Economic Barometer.

The latest Bank of England, East of England Agents’ summary of business conditions has shown that:

• The manufacturing output for both export and domestic markets has continued to grow slowly.
• The housing market has continued to strengthen
• Annual growth in retail sales moved forward at a slow pace.
• Investment intentions have remained very modest
• Increases in manufacturing and service sector prices remained subdued

The full Bank of England Agents’ Summary is attached.

At a recent meeting of the Norwich Chamber Council, Karen O’Kane the Programme Director for Better Broadband for Norfolk and John Cullum, the Senior Deployment Manager for BT Openreach provided a progress report on upgrading broadband in Norfolk and highlighted the benefits to business.

Facts about Next Generation Access (NGA) Infrastructure:

• 600 cabinets and 157 local telephone exchanges in Norfolk
• Starting Point: Installation of fibre spines to connect local Exchange Areas to the nearest Head Exchange.
• Average length of a fibre spine in the UK is 3km to 5km
• Average Norfolk fibre spine length will be 13km

Click here to view short video showing how better broadband will be implemented.

Constraints in supplying the NGA infrastructure:

• Capacity and conditions of the existing infrastructure i.e. the ducts through which the fibre will be laid
• Availability of power in rural areas
• Timescales surrounding planning applications
• Necessary road closures – which will be more prevalent in rural locations than urban ones

The locations for the first phase of improvements have been recently announced and it is expected that every couple of months updates on further locations will be advised. You can find out the status of the nearest exchange by clicking here and entering your postcode.

Benefits to Business:

Better broadband will provide new opportunities for businesses in Norfolk allowing them to innovate and expand into different markets. It also has the potential to increase efficiency and drive down costs by offering access to:

• Cloud computing – business data and software applications that are hosted remotely. Many cloud based business applications are now available ranging from basic office software to more sophisticated business software such as customer relationship management systems
• Voice over internet (VoIP) communication systems which enable basic call routing and voicemail through to video conferencing.
• Web conferencing enables businesses to meet in real time and share desktops
• Data transfer – upload latest content quickly and effectively to keep ecommerce and other websites up to date. Send and receive large files (e.g. complex plans and drawings, videos etc).
• Remote data storage – backup business data automatically and regularly to a remote and secure location.
• Flexible working – work from the office, from the home or on the move in a way and at a time that meets your business, and employee, needs.

The Norfolk and Suffolk Local Transport Body (LTB) has been created. This is a new body that will receive funding from the government for large transport schemes in our region. It will cover the geographical area of the two counties and New Anglia LEP, and is likely to receive around £39m of funding for major transport schemes over the 2015-19 spending period.

The Norfolk and Suffolk LTB is one of many local transport bodies that have been set up across the country to manage major transport scheme money. Whereas previously this money was managed centrally, government has now devolved the funding to local areas. The LTB comprises representatives from the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) and the two local transport authorities (Norfolk County Council and Suffolk County Council).

A ‘Long-List’ has been derived from existing, agreed, and adopted strategies such as the counties’ Local Transport Plans, Growth Plans and Infrastructure Plans. Because these plans have already had extensive stakeholder engagement, the LTBare confident that the ‘Long-List’ is a good starting point to identify the transport projects to which they should direct its funding.

The Norfolk and Suffolk LTB are currently seeking the views of the local business community onthe ‘Long-List’ plus any suggestions for additional large capital transport schemesthat should be includedin the spending programme for 2014-19. Your comments will help provide a starting point and will allow the priorities to be assigned. The consultation period ends at midday on Friday 12 July 2013.

For more information on the consultation and to access full details of the ‘Long -List’ click here.

The British Chambers of Commerce recently carried out an International Trade Survey on businesses across Norfolk and the rest of the UK. The results showed that exporting was on the increase, rising from 32% of those surveyed in 2012 to 39% in 2013.

Some interesting responses were received from Norfolk businesses – please take a look at the Norfolk Survey Results.

Thank you to all of you who took the time to respond to the survey.

At a recent meeting of the Great Yarmouth Chamber Council, the members were pleased to note several positive good news stories for Great Yarmouth:

• Pinch Point Funding of £4.7m has been awarded for the new road between the A143 and the A12, which will service the Great Yarmouth Enterprise Zone and will also facilitate 1,000 new homes and help create 15 hectares of industrial land.
• A recent report from the Town Centre Partnership highlighted that footfall in the town centre was up by 13% during May and in the seven weeks running up to 1 June 2013 it increased by 9%.
• Funding bids have been submitted for the regeneration of the Co-op building and a joint bid from Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft College has been submitted to provide workforce development funding for training in areas such as engineering, travel and tourism.

The Great Yarmouth Chamber Council members also debated the New Anglia LEP Apprenticeship Plan and whilst the members supported the intention of the plan, they expressed concern regarding the reality of persuading SMEs tofacilitateapprenticeships, as it may be a hard task to change the perception of many SMEsto apprenticeships.

To help with just this concern, the Norfolk Chamber has created an Apprenticeship Broker Service which is an active step in encouraging more of the region’s businesses to take on apprentices. This service will guide businesses though the apprenticeship process and work on your behalf to make the recruitment process as simple and straight forward as possible. For more details contact the Chamber team on 01603 625977 or e-mail [email protected].

• In the three months to January 2013, unemployment fell by 5,000, and employment rose by 24,000
• Youth unemployment fell by 43,000, but remains high
• In the first quarter of 2013, public sector employment fell by 22,000, while private sector employment increased by 46,000

Commenting on the unemployment figures, published today by the ONS, David Kern, Chief Economist at the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said:

“This modest improvement in the labour market is very welcome, especially as it reverses the decline seen in the last couple of months. Despite the level of inactivity rising slightly, the UK labour market remains robust and is performing well by international standards. However pay, excluding bonuses, remains well below inflation at 0.9%, exacerbating the squeeze on real incomes.

“The private sector is creating jobs while the public sector shrinks, which proves that British businesses are able to drive the economic recovery while circumstances at home and abroad remain challenging. In this month’s Spending Review, the Chancellor should look towards a shift of priorities away from current spending and towards capital investment, to improve the supply potential of the economy.”

There are now only 2 weeks left to submit your entry for the Chamber Awards. The Chamber Awards are considered one of the UK’s most hotly contested and prestigious business awards.

Norfolk has lots of highly successful businesses and this is your opportunity to showcase the best of Norfolk at a national level. The Awards recognise and reward business success with a range of specialist categories to meet the needs of any organisation. Each year hundreds of businesses compete for the coveted National Chamber Awards along with the £25,000 cash prize on offer.

The following categories are now open for entry:

• Online Business of the Year
• Most Promising New Business
• Exporter of the Year
• Excellence in Innovation
• Commitment to People Development
• Marketing Campaign of the Year
• Outstanding Personal Achievement
• The Sustainability Award

Entry to the Chamber Awards is free for Norfolk Chamber members – so take the first step towards winning and enter your business today. Businesses submitting an entry for any of the above award categories by Friday 21 June will automatically be entered into a prize draw to win an iPad Mini.

The final closing date for entries is 28 June and the regional winners will be announced on 30th September. The winners will go through to compete in the National Final, where they will be judged by a panel of business leaders and entrepreneurs. The Chamber Awards programme will conclude with the prestigious gala awards dinner on 28th November in central London, where one business will be awarded the £25,000 prize courtesy of the RBS Group. To enter online click here.

Read updates issued by the Export Control Organisation including details about imposition of arms embargoes, Open General Export Licence amendments or announcements about Control List changes.

Notice to Exporters 2013/14 In a recent Notice to Exporters (2013/11), the ECO advised that changes to SPIRE, that would enable you to provide them with information to meet government transparency requirements, would be completed in April. It has since become clear that further development time is necessary and they are now planning to roll out the reporting system in July.

At a recent meeting of the Chamber Planning & Development Group, members advised that there has been a small improvement in the development market. Although some development projects were underway, the housing market showed more signs of improvement than the commercial property market. Commercial developers were being very cautious and had little appetite for development without guaranteed end users.

A robust mortgage market is required if further improvements further in the house building market is to be achieved, which at present does not appear to be happening on a large scale, despite Government initiatives. There is however optimism within the Housing industry with respect to the Governments new Mortgage funding initiative NewBuy. The NewBuy scheme helps people bridge the deposit gap, allowing people who only have a 5% deposit purchase a new house, it is proposed that NewBuy will be rolled out to existing houses in 2004. It was felt however whilst this may stimulate the market in the short term care should be taken that it did not artificially raise prices and create more of a problem in the mortgage market long term.

Jonathan Cage, Chair of the Chamber Planning & Development Group and Managing Director of Create Consulting Engineers said: “The market is still very challenging, however there does appear to be some small improvement in the house building sector. Clearly we need a focussed effort to ensure that Norfolk makes the most of the opportunities for inward investment, both in terms of housing and the commercial sector.”

Mike Strawson has received a prestigious honour, in recognition of more than half a century’s work promoting British exports.

Mike, who has been working with the Norfolk Chamber for more than a decade, delivers the organisation’s highly successful training programmes covering all aspects of international trade.

He has received a Lifetime Achievement award from the Institute of Export for his outstanding contribution to export sales and also in teaching international trade skills to others. He was one of only three people to receive the honour.

Mike, who’s 71 and has been involved in exporting since he was 17, has also received a prestigious Fellowship from the Institute he first joined as a student in 1962. The organisation has just 24 Fellows.

“It’s a source of great pride because it’s an award given to me by my peers – the highest honour anyone can give,” said Mike. “I’ve spent a lifetime doing something I thoroughly enjoy. And I’ve had a lot of pleasure in travelling and learning about different cultures, trying different foods and making many friends around the world.”

Mike’s career has involved working with top firms such as Croda Chemicals, Triang Toys, the Bunzl Group and Novatech Adhesives.

Tracey Howard, International Trade Director at Norfolk Chamber said “It’s a privilege to work alongside Mike. He’s passionate about international trade and is without doubt the top export trainer in the country.

“I’m sure many of our local exporters who have been trained by Mike, will join me in congratulating him on this honour, which is well deserved.”