Christchurch and East Dorset Councils growth agenda taking shape.

Being part of the interview panel to recruit some strength to our business development project has been a very interesting but challenging experience. Listening to applicants experiences(from all over the Country) of developing strategies to deal with Councils responsibilities for business growth and deciding the relevance of some of the initiatives to us at CBC/EDDC has been very interesting. One clear message which came through was that we do have to engage with business right across the economic spectrum and include their ambitions in our overall strategy. We are fortunate in CBC because we do have a good shape to our economy, from tourism to aerospace. However we also have some challenges such as the anomaly of the low average wage against high house prices or the skill shortage for our more technical businesses. Our local transport infra-structure is of concern. So we need to plan and act with innovation to tackle some real basic issues, this will involve a more open discussion with schools and colleges, a better understanding of how we can influence and enable more apprentice schemes where they are needed and some way whereby we can nurture our young talented community to give them a local future so that they stay with us accommodated and content to remain and contribute. A really good challenge.