MEMBER UPDATE JUNE 2020 | JUNE 2020 PAGE | 02 CHRIS SHIRLING-ROOKE REFLECTS It is my immense pleasure to welcome you to the June edition of the Mersey Maritime Ezine! Once again I am astounded by the volume of material we are able to present to you this month from a whole range of businesses and organisations connected with the maritime sector here in the Liverpool City Region and beyond. I can’t quite believe it is June, very nearly July, already as we have passed the longest day and by rights we should be looking forward to a little relaxation and refreshment over the summer months. This year has been quite different! The global pandemic continues to affect all of our lives, and whilst for many businesses their work has continued apace, I sense there’s a real desire to start returning to something that looks like ‘normal’. This will still mean being sensible, alert and alive to the new realities that the health crisis has thrown our way and recognising that it hasn’t yet gone away. It is worth reflecting for just a moment on where we are as an organisation and how we have responded to the challenge we’ve faced as a maritime community. During the last 15 weeks Mersey Maritime has: Continued to provide guidance and support for our 200 members E Delivered 22 digital events… … to over 550 individuals Issued 2 industry wide surveys, and C Fed the results into national and local government policy and planning. E I truly believe we are ‘Stronger Together’ and I hope you will agree that I Mersey Maritime has risen to the challenge that the last few weeks has presented to us all. P In my reflections at the start of our Ezine in May, I made the bold claim that I didn’t think it could get any bigger. How wrong I was! This month we are proud to feature over thirty individual articles, drawn from across the industry. There will be some familiar faces and new ones for you to read T about but one theme is consistent: the maritime sector in this area hasn’t gone away. Our ‘Member of the Month’ for June is Beech Group and we are H delighted to reflect on the immense work that our good friend and advocate for Mersey Maritime, Chris Wainwright, and his team are doing. There’s positive news of promotions for team members in businesses like Hill G Dickinson and Haines Watts and significant developments and expansion of opportunities in local ports. Do delve a little beyond the text we offer here as each article also features a link to further information and website materials. U In response to COVID-19 and, crucially, using the survey data our members have supplied, during this last month we have partnered with Maritime UK O to launch the Maritime Sector Recovery Plan. This document is the basis of our ask of government, both local and national, as we move through the ‘Restart, Recover and Renew’ phases of the pandemic crisis. Your voice is H reflected directly within its pages and the significant common threads that emerged from what you were telling us on the ground in your business, T amongst your staff and around what your priorities are for the future. Through the Maritime Business Continuity Taskforce, on which I have been a member from the outset, the document has been presented at the highest level of national government and we have embarked upon a series of direct engagement meetings with local and regional politicians. The plan was emailed to every councillor locally and also in parts of Cheshire (nearly six hundred individuals), every Member of Parliament in the North West of England, and every significant player (Chief Executive, Leader or elected Mayor) in the tiers of regional government that we engage with. One-to-one briefings are now being held and action points agreed. We are determined that this won’t be a cosmetic exercise to produce or endorse a document with a wish list, but a real and live opportunity to deliver the essential priorities contained within it. Read the plan by clicking this link: https://www.maritimeuk.org/programmes/maritime-sector-recovery-plan/ But the conversation doesn’t stop there. In July we will hold two seminars for members, particularly those who engaged with the survey activity, to deep dive into the results with the help of Simon Barnes of the University of Kent. Simon helped to ‘crunch the numbers’ and identify the multiple, but consistent, threads in the analysis which helped us to hone the results and develop our priority asks. It may be that we repeat the survey at some point in the future, because we know the challenge around COVID-19 recovery is going to be long-term, but at the moment we plan to do something a little different. The seminar events will cover the results of the survey activity but also give colleagues an opportunity to reflect on the following themes which appear to be the most prominent concerns at this time: The weakening of regional, national and international supply chains An apparent lowering of overall demand in the sector The challenges presented by new operating models What is the impact of (some) failing or positive support mechanisms put in place by government, and The testing of ‘new ways of working’, their effectiveness and challenges presented. Please engage with this activity. By being proactive and responsive to the needs of industry we can continue to influence government and help deliver the recovery our sector needs as the economy responds to the unprecedented impact that the virus has had upon it. We have been making efforts to make the Maritime Knowledge Hub as ‘Covid-secure’ as possible so Mersey Maritime can begin to open our doors in a limited way. It won’t quite be business as normal and staffing arrangements will remain fluid, but we wish to, safely, start the process of getting back into our own routine. You can be assured we will not do anything to compromise the well-being of our members and partner organisations. It may be some time before we are able to meet physically in our usual manner for ‘Face-2-Face’ and other networking opportunities, but the team remain at your disposal at any time. Please do get in touch if we can help in any way. In the meantime, have a fantastic month and don’t forget to share your own news and activity with us so we can showcase just how dynamic our industry continues to be here in Merseyside next time around. | JUNE 2020 PAGE | 04 TRADE MINISTER ISSUES RALLYING CALL TO MARITIME SECTOR Addressing an online seminar co-hosted by Mersey Maritime, Western Union and Maritime UK, trade minister Graham Stuart said sea-borne trade would lead the post-COVID recovery. Tony McDonough reports. Trade minister Graham Stuart has put Merseyside and the UK’s maritime sector front and centre of Britain’s post- coronavirus recovery. Addressing an online seminar co-hosted by Mersey Maritime, Western Union Business Solutions and Maritime UK, the Minister for Exports at the UK Department for International Trade said sea-borne trade would “lead the recovery”. Mersey Maritime chief executive, Chris Shirling-Rooke, opened the Global Trade and Maritime Virtual Summit, introducing Mr Stuart as well as Martin Beck, lead UK economist at Oxford Economics, and Hikmet Ersek, chief executive of Western Union. There was also a panel discussion which brought in Andrew Summerill, Global Head of Payments at Western Union, and Dr Carl Stephen Patrick Hunter, chief executive at Coltraco Ultrasonics. Business leaders and entrepreneurs from Merseyside and across the UK joined the online audience. Ambition and spirit Mr Stuart began by invoking the spirit of British explorer James Cook, who spoke of the value of “experience, resilience and pragmatism”. The minister added: “Cook spoke of the ambition and spirit of endeavour that we must embrace today “As we emerge from this crisis we will need to be stronger, more open and more dynamic than before and the maritime sector will be part of that. The sector can already boast world class excellence… we need to build on these strengths and take the golden opportunities offered by global trade.” He spoke of the importance of “fighting protectionism” and encouraging free trade across the world, adding that the diversification of our supply chains was now “more important than ever”. The UK is now looking to strike trade deals with the rest of the world following our departure from the European Union. Mr Stuart spoke about the importance of the negotiations with the US and also said the UK was opening dialogue with Japan, the biggest economy in the transpacific region. “The biggest single thing we can do is open up global markets for UK firms… we will need a vibrant maritime sector. The Department for International Trade has teams on the ground both here and across the world who are determined that we have a trade-led recovery,” said Mr Stuart. PAGE | 05 | JUNE 2020 Global connections In a pre-recorded address, Hikmet Ersek spoke about the importance of connecting people across the world, something his company had been doing for 170 years, he added. “Sea transportation is enormously important. By 2050, it is estimated 80% of all global trade will be done by sea. When goods and money move then good things happen. When goods and money do not move then things will not happen,” he said. Upbeat analysis Martin Beck from Oxford Economics offered a detailed analysis of the UK economy and its prospects in a post-COVID world and his assessment was more upbeat than many may have imagined.