Sheffield Chamber’s president urges the government to stop "symbolically contradictory" BIS policy office relocation

In May, the government confirmed plans to relocate the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) policy office from Sheffield to London by January 2018.

As a result, 247 policy jobs were set to be moved to the capital to work at the new headquarters, which will combine the functions of 14 offices on a site close to Westminster.

Earlier this month, however, it was announced that 100 of those jobs in Sheffield will be saved. 100 BIS employees will now move to the Department for Further Education, whose staff share the same city centre building.

87 jobs are still set to be transferred to London, with a further 70 still at risk.

Following the lead of Paul Blomfield, MP for Sheffield Central, who recently penned an open letter to Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, Greg Clark, Jillian Thomas, president of the Sheffield Chamber of Commerce, has also reached out to Mr Clark.

Echoing Paul’s opinions on the issue, Jillian reiterates the importance of retaining the BIS jobs in Sheffield.

Jillian said:

“Whilst belatedly, could I congratulate you on your appointment as Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

I would like to take this opportunity to restate the importance to retain the BIS jobs in Sheffield; the BIS team provide a very high skilled and well developed workforce. These cornerstone jobs are important to not only the Sheffield region economy, but would provide a strong demonstration from Government and Theresa May’s commitment ’to make Britain work for everyone’. It was very clear in the EU referendum results, that the views and thoughts of the northern communities were not being considered by a narrow base of civil servants, failing to reflect the diverse views of all the country. The role of a UK Government to consider all, not the few.

As a region we have undertaken a significant amount of constructive decisions and work for inward investment, with the recent announcement of our ties to China, and HSBC to shortly state a significant expansion into Sheffield, with the aim to make Sheffield one of the financial regions of the North.

Whilst it is pleasing to hear that jobs are being created in higher and further education and skills for those from the Business Department, to the Education Department in Theresa May’s reshuffle, we would call the conclusion to move the BIS dept. from Sheffield to London is stopped immediately, and the decision reversed. We then call for further jobs to be re-located, and developed in the Sheffield City Region.

We fail to understand the logic of such a policy in centralising the teams in this way; in the debate in the House of Commons, Paul Blomfield MP eloquently spoke, clearly identifying that this had not been, nor was there a case for this to go ahead on a cost saving basis. In fact, the closure of Sheffield and movement to London would cost a further £2.5m per annum. This policy is not logical and is symbolically contradictory, in the face of support for the Northern Powerhouse and Devolution.

We conclude that it is essential that government not only recognise, but implement and continue to support the importance for capacity, spread across the country. A more centralised approach in London distracts from these principles, and reflects why so many from the North and other regions outside the capital feel little or no engagement in decision made by central government. Jobs created and paid for by tax payers monies, should be the benefit of all of the United Kingdom, not just few in London and the South East. It is essential that we give career opportunities to those coming out of our outstanding universities in the city, and to retain their knowledge and spending power to create further jobs in the region’s future.

I would like to echo Paul Blomfield Member of Parliament for Sheffield Central call to create a new Department – notably with “industrial strategy“ in its title and for this dept. to be located in Sheffield at 2 St Paul’s Place. We believe that there is no finer example in the United Kingdom of a City having to re-generate it’s self after the loss of the Coal and the Steel industry, in making it’s self at the forefront of world beating advanced manufacturing.“