Monday 9 March 2015

MIPIM: The East Midlands Powerhouse

A shot in the arm for Nottingham today as it heads out to MIPIM, the international property development and investment expo in Cannes.
From the UK perspective, the event is likely to be dominated by talk about regional devolution, led of course by the narrative around the so-called Northern Powerhouse - that (theoretical) swathe of economies stretching from Manchester in the West to Leeds in the East.
Manchester and Leeds are big cities and have always had strong economies ever since the days when they became established as great Victorian mercantile centres. They've had powerful politics ever since, and a strong voice in Westminster has ensured that the modern-day Northern Powerhouse  narrative has taken hold.
But here we are on the eve of MIPIM and a new set of statistics confirm - not for the first time - that they're not quite the powerhouse that this narrative implies.
According to business advisors PwC, the fastest growing region outside London and the South East this year will be not the North West or Yorkshire but the East Midlands.
PwC's figures show that our regional economy will grow by 2.5 per cent this year - a percentage point clear of most other regions and two percentage points clear of the North West (which is on 2.3 per cent).
This points to a sustained recovery in our economy, one where the continuing uncertainties around what's happening (or not happening) in the eurozone are being nicely countered by very low inflation and a low oil price.
On that basis, says Paul Norbury, PwC's senior partner in the East Midlands, we should start preparing for a rise in interest rates, probably next year.
Other than a suggestion that house price rises will continue to slow, there's no specific news on property in PwC's outlook.
But it does add a useful element to Nottingham's narrative at MIPIM: Who needs to be a powerhouse when you're the fastest-growing region in the UK?

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