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Identifying Growth Sectors in the South East Economy

I have been referring to the initiatives that we have introduced, such as the prompt payment code, the ““time to pay”” initiative, business health checks and the enterprise finance guarantee scheme. About 700 of our businesses have been offered almost £70 million in loans, and 20 businesses have received loans totalling £2.4 million under SEEDA’s transitional loan fund, creating or preserving about 800 jobs. There is now real help for businesses and individuals throughout our region, not a blank page as we would expect from Opposition Members. The effects of the recession are still with us, but it will come to an end and we must make sure that recovery benefits all individuals, households and businesses in the region. All of us will have in our constituencies those who have been left behind after previous recessions, and we cannot let that happen again. Through SEEDA, we are focusing on the key sectors that will lead our regional and global economy out of recession most successfully, such as advanced engineering, ICT, life sciences, environmental technologies, aerospace and defence. We have already seen many successful businesses in such sectors in the south-east—businesses that have kept growing throughout the recession. I have had the privilege of visiting many of them. For example, Ceres Power at Crawley is developing cutting edge fuel cell technology and plans to expand its manufacturing to a new base at Horsham thus creating 100 highly skilled jobs. Just a few months ago, I visited the Diamond Light Synchrotron at Harwell, to which I referred earlier. It is the largest science facility to be built in the United Kingdom for 30 years. The synchrotron is a world-class resource, providing research facilities for virtually all fields of science and engineering to help create the high-tech jobs and commercial applications of the future. Through my regular dialogue with SEEDA, I have kept in touch with other exciting developments in the region in such important sectors.