Question and Answer Session: COVID-19 Recovery - The Next Steps for London

Jules Pipe CBE (Deputy Mayor for Planning, Regeneration and Skills):  I ought to begin by saying that we should not underestimate the size of the task ahead of us.  London’s recovery is going to require a massive effort from all concerned.  Our [London] Recovery Programme we have developed in collaboration with London Councils and the members of the rest of the London Recovery Board.  It reflects the short-term, medium-term and long-term challenges and actions that we are going to need to build back this city stronger, better, fairer and greener for everyone in London.

It is really important to always consider the context that we are in currently about timescales and how far we have already come.  It is the work that has already been done collectively to date that really enables us to be ready now to aid London’s recovery as we emerge from what is now a third national lockdown.  That is what I mean about context and the rolling nature of the waves we have had and the lockdowns we have had, which has challenged everyone from the national Government down to plan for the recovery, with people constantly saying, “Are you about to lock down?  Are we about to reopen everything?”  The cyclical nature of the pandemic has been a real problem in answering that question.  That has resulted in us now planning for recovery for nearly a year now because of these consecutive waves.  Let us not forget that only six weeks ago we were once again in the midst of a crisis with hospitalisations reaching their peak.  Deaths - sadly - reached their peak only at the end of January [2021], just over a month ago.

The combined impact of the most recent lockdown and the current rapid rollout of the vaccination programme has thankfully brought down infections, hospitalisations and deaths.  That is hugely welcome.  We are now well prepared for what the Prime Minister has said is a cautious reopening of the economy, as he set out in his roadmap out of lockdown.

The first London Recovery Board was held in the middle of last year and it brought together all those public, private, voluntary sector and community sector leaders, and those from the faith sectors as well. to develop the nine recovery missions, which I am sure we will talk about further and go into detail on about London’s response to driving recovery forward.  They have had an exceptional level of public engagement and consultation to develop those.

In the short term, our priority is to ensure that we continue to support the vaccination rollout in London.  That is the key step that we have to make at the moment to ensure that everyone is encouraged to take the vaccine when offered.  Vaccination hesitancy is a big issue that is being tackled at the moment and, thankfully, is declining.  That is good news, but there are still too many communities that remain concerned about it.  It is vital that we continue to support the efforts to persuade as many as possible to take the vaccine.  That is number one.

It is also a critical priority to ensure that we support people in businesses between now and the economy fully reopening, because it is not going to be a big bang with everything open on the first day.  We know that it is not before 21 June [2021] at the earliest.  We are examining the Chancellor’s [of the Exchequer] Budget Statement from yesterday and, while we would welcome any increased support from the Government, the trend that can be fairly described as ‘levelling down London’ should be a real concern for everyone regarding the growth of our capital city.

We also need to ensure going forward that we see the Government’s support for the city’s long-term recovery plans.  These are set out in the nine missions that I mentioned.  There are really clear goals to those missions and they are stretching goals.  They have cross-party backing across the political spectrum through London Councils and the backing of business, civic and faith leaders.  They effectively form the Mayor’s [of London] roadmap for a safe and full reopening of London’s economy over the next 12 months.  It has been produced with businesses and in close collaboration, as I said, with London’s boroughs and the London COVID Business Forum as well.  The roadmap sets out the key actions for partners across London and for national Government, and it draws on engagement with businesses right throughout London.

Finally, we want the recovery from COVID to reshape our city into one that is fairer.  It has to be more equal; greener; and more economically, socially and environmentally resilient than it was before.  We want to see thriving town centres, high streets and neighbourhoods across London.  It is not all about just the centre and getting people back into the centre.  We want to improve wellbeing and access to a strengthened healthcare system.  Recovery should be about the safe and full reopening of London’s economy, not just reopening at any cost.  At the heart of that has to be rebuilding consumer and business confidence across all sectors, especially the ones that have been the hardest hit: retail, hospitality, culture, leisure and tourism.  Of course, that is the lifeblood of London’s economy.  International tourism and the cultural offer that we have is so crucial to getting London back into business.  That is what I would say our recovery should be looking like to ensure a longer-term recovery, safeguarding jobs, as well as creating new ones in growth sectors as well such as the green economy.

Navin Shah AM (Chair):  Thank you, Deputy Mayor, for a full and comprehensive background.