Womble Bond Dickinson, one of the region's leading law firms, has joined The Northern Echo's Level Up campaign, saying the region 'is truly on the cusp of something special'.
Womble Bond Dickinson is a transatlantic law firm serving corporate, individual and non-profit clients in every business sector from offices across the UK and America, including Newcastle and Wilton.
Their deep roots in the North East and passion for the future of the region meant the campaign was a perfect match
Peter Snaith, a partner in the firm's commercial team and head of its manufacturing sector group said "We are committed to playing our part in the future prosperity of the North East by using our local, national and international reach and expertise to benefit the region’s leading sectors, businesses, people and organisations.
"From offices in Newcastle and Wilton we want to take a lead role in ensuring that the entire region succeeds and is an international leader in key sectors such as renewable energy and advanced manufacturing.
"The North East has often been modest when it comes to celebrating our achievements and strengths, we want our region to be braver and shout far louder both nationally and internationally. We want to lend our voice to The Echo's Level Up campaign and to enable the North East to realise its full potential.
"The North East is a great place to do business and we want to continue to see levelling up in action, building upon recent developments such as Teesside securing Freeport status and Treasury North's move to Darlington. For levelling up to be realised, we need to see continued and consistent investment in our infrastructure to ensure the North East is fully appreciated as a great place for inward investment opportunities."
The Echo's Level Up campaign is all about uniting the region and giving it single voice to attract the best investment and highest levels of Government focus, and Nigel Emmerson, who heads the firm's Housing Group, said: "The region is made up of distinctive areas each with their own priorities and initiatives. However, the assets and skillsets we have across the North East are highly complementary and we are convinced that the region can best achieve its potential by playing to our collective strengths and working together.
"As a firm we want to use our teams located across the region and our Newcastle and Wilton bases to encourage and facilitate that collaboration. A key example followed the announcement that the region was successful with only one of our Freeport bids. Whilst the Freeport and Free Zones are on Teesside, we absolutely want to work with public bodies and businesses up and down the region to realise the opportunities for growth and deliver the ancillary Freeport benefits for our key sectors on a broader footprint.
"Given the focus on the region and the investment which is happening we feel the region, North and South, is truly on the cusp of something special and we intend to play our part in leading the region to future success.
"The next steps to ensure we truly level up include further investment into our transport and infrastructure, increased devolution and a real emphasis on skills and training, whilst delivering the high paid, high skilled jobs to retain our talent. There's a huge amount still to be done but the early signs are good.
"We want to build on the recent positive announcements such as the Teesside Freeport, Britishvolt, the East Coast Cluster, Envision, and Treasury North with an emphasis on future policy announcements linked to decarbonisation, enabling technologies for clean and sustainable manufacturing and also Freeports and international trade which we hope ensures they deliver the best value for the entire region."
To be part of The Echo's Level Up campaign contact mike.hughes@newsquest.co.uk or diane.searle@newsquest.co.uk
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