Lord Davies of Abersoch, Minister of State for Trade & Investment is an ex-banker. That was one of his opening lines to a crowd of about 150 business people at a UK Trade and Investment lunch today at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. You would expect then that cutting and running – like a few bankers we could mention – would not be a great move from a Minister three weeks into the job. This is a man who openly declared to the assembled throng that “he was here to listen” and get answers about the mobile business – even going to the lengths of asking everyone to email him their suggestions for how UKTI can help British businesses and how it can deliver better services.
But no.
In a speech filled with truisms – “the global downturn shows we are in an international global economy” – he asked the panel several reasonable questions. What will aging consumers want from mobiles? What will happen to payments and to the banking industry with mobile? He is also wondering about auto-translation of messaging. And should the very young be on mobiles? How do developing countries use mobiles to develop trade? All good questions. Perhaps in a global recession, three weeks into a job designed to help British business, the Minister concerned woud hang around for the answers.
But he left before the panel discussion had had a chance to answer his points.
Way to go, Minister.
I checked with the UKTI and a spokesman said “It was a bit unfortunate he had to leave and he should have said why he was leaving, which was actually in his written speech but which he didn’t manage to mention at the end. We are trying to cram his diary to get him to as many events as possible at MWC and he had to rush off to give out an award. If there’s a question you want to put we can get an answer to that next week. He’s quite keen to learn about the industry.”
fantastic post.
mobile minister
“If there’s a question you want to put…” !?
Fail.
This is top-notch journalism: shining the light on the mismatch between words and action.
Well done!
At least he is “quite keen to learn about the industry”.
What a phoney (terrible pun, I know)
I’m not happy with their response as it demonstrates that they’re shipping him around to ’show face’, rather than adding value. This is sad to see when people like Mark O’Neill and Tom Watson try to hard to change the perception that Ministers and MPs etc. are… well, we all know what they are.
Hi tech mobile minister…
““the global downturn shows we are in an international global economy”
This isn’t necessarily a truism but an allusion to decoupling, which was all the rage until it was spectacularly falsified:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decoupling#Decoupling_and_the_stock_market_declines_of_January_2008
This reminds me of a sketch from the ‘Thick of it’ where the minister makes his excuses to leave early from the tour of a factory.
This could be a scene straight from ‘The Thick Of It’
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0459159/