The chief executive of the North East's largest business membership organisation says he wants the region to secure a new business friendly devolution deal.
John McCabe, of the North East England Chamber of Commerce, has been engaging with local authority leaders to impress upon them the needs of businesses in a mooted deal that could bring together Gateshead, Sunderland, South Tyneside, Newcastle, North Tyneside, and Northumberland.
And he has urged businesses to come forward with their needs across areas such as skills and transport, where devolved powers are on the table and politicians are said to be close to reaching an agreement.
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Mr McCabe, who stood for election in the 2019 North of Tyne mayoral election, said: "If we get that deal over the line, there's a lot of money in Whitehall that's going to come our way and we're going to have the ability to take control ourselves over how that money is spent. If we get this wrong, or we don't do it, this opportunity is probably not going to come round again for a long time.
"The Chamber has a big role to play in talking to the people who are negotiating and writing that devolution deal to say: 'This is the deal we want for business.' "
Mr McCabe said he had spoken to a senior former minister of this Government who had told him the North East should demonstrate its ability to coalesce behind a plan so the "money would follow".
He also pointed to the example of Labour's Andy Burnham in Greater Manchester as evidence that mayors of different political colours to the Government could effectively negotiate benefits for their areas.
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He said: "It's about embedding a commitment in Government to levelling up - whether it's called that or something else. It's about making sure it survives a change in Prime Minister or a general election. We've got to make sure this is a plan, a strategy that we can stick to.
"The opportunity now is that we've got the Government's attention, we're talking to them about this devolution deal. Let's get that done and see it as the 'base camp' and then let's start climbing the mountain after that."
Speaking to Business Live and The Journal newspaper at this week's North East Expo, Mr McCabe said the Chamber was increasingly highlighting the impact of health inequalities - particularly wide healthy life expectancy disparities in the region that mean some workers are leaving the economy at a young age, exacerbating skills shortages.
Addressing those disparities, he said, was not just the right thing to do but also made economic sense and businesses were increasingly telling his organisation it was important though he acknowledged health was unlikely to form part of a devolution deal.
He said: "There are all sorts of metrics that we're at the wrong end of the league tables on. That might be school attainment, healthy life expectancy, child poverty - these things impact the economy and the economy impacts them.
"The Chamber's patch stretches from the Scottish borders right down to North Yorkshire and you've got almost three speeds of devolution within that patch. You've got the Tees Valley where it's absolutely thundering away at pace, then you've got the North of Tyne where there's a more limited, smaller devolution deal with not as much money or as many powers but it's making some progress, and then you've got that bit in the middle that doesn't have any devolution – and that's something we're addressing. It looks like some of those areas south of the River Tyne are going to come into that North of Tyne devolution deal."
A devolution deal would introduce a new metro mayor role, and with a renewed opportunity to market the region on the national and international stage.
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Mr McCabe said: "We do need to get better at our pitch. The example that I always use is - if you're a business in the Far East or the States and you're thinking about investing in the 海角视频 and you see that bit just south of Scotland and think "that looks quite interesting" – who do you ring? Who represents the North East in that way?
"What I sense is happening is a really urgent collaboration forming in the North East now - doing away with some of the barriers and silos we've had in the past, whether it's been between public and private sector, third sector, academia and health. Some of those lines are being blurred now and that's only got to be a good thing for team North East.
"To finish that off, we've got to capture what the message is. That really succinct elevator pitch that people talk about – what do we want to be known for?"