Agenda item

Executive Director Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City Senior Responsible Officer (SRO) to be heard.

The Chairman welcomed thePrivate Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO who presented on the Destination City Programme.

The presentation covered the following points:

·       The former Destination City Programme – focused on transforming the City into a leading leisure destination in the context of a significant reduction in footfall in the aftermath of the pandemic.

·       The new Destination City Programme – an enhanced initiative that goes beyond promoting the City as a leading leisure destination and becomes the growth strategy for the Square Mile.

·       New ambition – to position the City as an even more magnetic destination – for businesses, worker and visitors.

·       Destination City in the broader context of initiatives across the organisation – Innovation & Growth, the Resident Reset/City Belonging for example.

·       Plan of Collective Action – breaking down siloes, both internally and externally.

·       Major Workstreams/Key Actions – improving pedestrian connectivity between places, developing a consistently lively an animated ground floor experience, establishing a premium concierge service for relocating businesses, driving footfall Friday-Monday. Re-evaluation of social media strategy and possible partnership approaches, ensuring lease conditions in relevant commercial areas reflect a curated and appealing visitor experience, encouraging relevant services working with young people to prioritise school visits that align with Destination City priorities.

·       New Destination City Programme Hub to be established with recruitment currently underway – designed to provide a strategic and advisory function and support programme delivery.

·       Factors for Growth – footfall (daytime v nighttime? Weekday v weekend?) spend.

·       The City’s USPs

·       Attracting workers – days in the office

The Chairman thanked the Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO for her presentation and invited questions from the floor.

An Alderman commended the initiative and commented that proposals to break down siloes such as through the creation of the new Hub would be critical to its success. He went on to say that this was a Corporation asset in which all had a stake, he therefore encouraged all on the Court of Aldermen to actively engage with and help take this forward. He went on comment on the current absence of a Communications Strategy which was a weakness to rectify in order to better weave together the narrative around this. With reference to the Lord Mayor’s Show, he also felt that this should be plugged into the Programme and was equally a corporate asset.

An Alderwoman commented that this was a huge, city-wide programme and therefore queried how quickly the key priorities could be met.

Another Alderman questioned if there was any collaboration with City BIDs on the programme. He also questioned how the programme would encompass all Wards in the City, particularly residential Wards.

An Alderman queried whether there was any inherent conflict between promoting the City specifically as a financial centre as opposed to other major cities such as Cardiff, Belfast or Edinburgh given the Lord Mayor’s designated role of promoting the whole of the UK in terms of financial and professional services. He went on to question what more might be done to attract visitors from diverse communities and different faiths to the City.

Another Alderman queried when the programme might be up and running under the direction of the new Hub and to whom Members should submit any ideas going forward. She went on to query the role of and focus on residents here.

The Deputy Chairman picked up the point around City BIDS and queried their terms of reference and how the Destination City Programme could most effectively work alongside them in terms of delivery and animation.

The Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO reported that in addition to wide Member engagement she had also been engaging with her peers across the organisation and with various SLT groups in an attempt to avoid siloe work. She enthusiastically agreed that both this programme and events such as the Lord Mayors Show were major corporate assets that, in terms of the latter, was not just about the day itself but about the wider story that the Corporation had to tell.

The Committee were informed that it was important to note that it would not be possible for the Programme to engage all stakeholders signposted to date or to achieve all desired outcomes in terms of growth and promotion. With specific reference to residents, it was noted that the correct vehicle through which specific offerings here would be driven and promoted was the Resident Reset.

In terms of timelines and measures of success, Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO reported that she had spent a lot of time meeting stakeholders both internally and externally (including the BIDS) in an attempt to better understand the key changes that the programme was trying to effect, collating data around this and then focusing on 2-3 key points to hone in on before embedding this practice to build upon further. With further reference to the BIDS, the Committee were informed that these were important delivery partners at a hyper-local level. It was acknowledged that the City Corporation were not always an easy or specific partner to work with and one of the key ambitions of the Destination City Programme was therefore to better articulate what growth looks like for the City, through which metrics/mechanisms this would be measured and how partners could best help deliver on this more specific, common purpose.

In response to the query around any inherent tensions, the Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO reported that both the work undertaken by Innovation & Growth and the Destination City Programme were driving for growth and prosperity across the nation, including the Square Mile. She added that moving the Programme away from Innovation and Growth would also help alleviate any tension and that the role of the Lord Mayor around enhancing the profile of financial and professional services would only enhance the work undertaken by the Programme.

In terms of offerings for diverse communities, it was reported that when breaking down the demographics of the Programme’s audiences, understanding what offerings different communities would like to see and how they might prefer to use their leisure time would be an important component.

In terms of timings, it was hoped that the Hub would be established and operating by March 2025.

In response to further questions, the Private Secretary to the Policy Chairman and Destination City SRO reported that the juxtaposition between the historic City and its modernity provided the Square Mile with a very unique story that it needed to be better at promoting and showcasing going forward. She emphasised that the City BIDs were very keen to work with the Corporation on this but that the onus was on the City to better articulate its ask in the first instance. In terms of signposting, the Committee were informed that discussions had already been held with Whitbread, the owners of Premier Inn, the Uks biggest hotel brand, on their City stay statistics. The City Corporation were keen to explore what City based ‘content’ could perhaps be pushed to those customers making bookings in the City going forward.Conversations as to better physical sand electronic signposting of certain events on the City’s streets were also now underway.