Bernard Ginns: Plenty of takers for RDA hotseat despite doubts over future

DESPITE the question mark hanging over its future, I hear that the regional development agency has had a strong level of interest in the chairman's job, which will soon become available.

There is a real likelihood that Yorkshire Forward, which has an annual budget of around 330m, will have its wings clipped this year or next when the inevitable and necessary round of cost-cutting gets into full sway.

The question is by how much. But there is a strong possibility that the RDA could be totally unrecognisable in 12 months' time.

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Not that this has deterred the hopefuls who have put their names forward for the role. I can reveal that the shortlist is now down to four or five people, including some high-calibre individuals.

Barry Dodd, Chris Pilling and Mark Andrews are believed to be among the front-runners.

Mr Dodd, an ICI graduate trainee, is a successful entrepreneur and the chairman and chief executive of GSM Group, a manufacturer of industrial graphic products. He is also chairman of CO2 Sense Yorkshire, a company set up by Yorkshire Forward to help businesses become more environmentally friendly. He has been on the board of the RDA since 2006.

Mr Pilling is a high-flying director at HSBC – one of the banks we didn't have to bail out – who used to be chief executive of the bank's First Direct operation in Leeds. He is still based in the city, but travels frequently in his new role as head of direct banking at HSBC. Other credentials include five years as Asda's head of marketing.

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Mark Andrews, the former chief executive of Ilkley-based NG Bailey, is an experienced and well-regarded business leader whose abruptly announced departure from the family-owned building services provider shocked the region's business community. He is also chairman of the Yorkshire and Humber Regional Skills Partnership.

Odgers, the national headhunting firm with an office in Leeds, has completed its interviews. The panel is set to meet at the end of January, which is then expected to put forward two names as recommendations.

A government minister will have the ultimate say on whose name is chosen. I'll do my best to let you know first...

SPEAKING of spending cuts, Whitehall is rumoured to be preparing cuts in public spending in some departments of between 25-40 per cent in readiness for the new government, whichever party is voted in.

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Public spending of all kinds will be under the microscope, but it's a safe bet to say that frontline services will be the last to feel the slash of the knife.

What will go first are projects and programmes that fall into the 'nice-to-have' rather than 'need-to-have' camps.

There are lots of these in Yorkshire and those organisations that receive public funding will have to up their game considerably if they want to avoid the chop.

This won't be without some pain for the rest of us – remember that lots of these quangos and state-owned companies spend money in the private sector and help keep the economy pumping.

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A lot of this activity is done under the umbrella of economic development. Whether this concept survives the savage cuts heading this way remains to be seen. Economic development could go the same way as regeneration, which seems to have gone out of the window in the last 18 months.

Expect some of the cuts to wreak havoc, but try to draw some comfort from knowing that we are going to be living within our means again after a decade of over-geared insanity.

Anyone who dismisses the scale of the problem facing the nation's books might like to bear in mind what McKinsey consultants have said about Britain's debt relative to gross domestic product.

According to the consultancy, the gross level of private and public debt now equates to 449 per cent of GDP.

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Any business with that level of debt would be heading for the knackers' yard.

On a positive note, there is a medium and long-term solution and it is relatively simple.

The country, and in particular, this region should return to what it does best – manufacturing.

Austin Mitchell, the Labour MP for Greater Grimsby, said eloquently in the Yorkshire Post at the weekend that "only manufacturing revival can provide the jobs, and generate the productivity increases and the exports we need. Manufacturing is the future, not the past, and its best prospects are back home where it grew and once prospered".

A good starting point would be to follow the Master Cutler James Newman's call for a moratorium on all new business legislation around bureaucracy, health and safety and the environment.