Recently in West Midlands Category

In one of the liveliest Budgets in recent memory, chancellor George Osborne was at times lost for words. With the outlook for the economy significantly downgraded, some are saying that this is a Budget of paradoxes. For example, Britain will avoid a triple-dip recession after the return to negative growth in Q4 of 2012, but the economy is only likely to grow by 0.6% this year - a big fall from the 1.1% previously forecast.

The West Midlands region was fleetingly mentioned as Osborne confirmed the government's backing to Lord Heseltine's call for a 'single pot' of money for local enterprise and the country's 39 LEP's to share and promised to implement the proposal.

The Help to Buy scheme is welcomed but will it truly revitalise the housing market? And the announcement regarding £3.5bn investment in infrastructure is positive, but which schemes are set to benefit and how quickly?

As people digest the finer details from this afternoon's speech, here is some initial industry reaction:

Stephen Hemming, director, planning & development at Lambert Smith Hampton in Birmingham, welcomes the chancellor's announcement of £3.5bn support for infrastructure projects, but adds: "It is unfortunate that the spending won't come in until 2015/16, although it is appreciated that the money comes as a result of savings elsewhere. The question is what will be delivered and where? Will we see the big, potentially game changing schemes getting delayed by challenges as with HS2 or will it be the smaller, but in some cases no less important, projects such as new roads and so on which have been put on the back burner finally being dusted off."  

Jan Thompson, Jones Lang LaSalle's Birmingham-based Midland chairman also welcomes the £3bn spending on infrastructure and acceptance of a single pot for local enterprise but states again the key questions on everyone's lips - how much will Whitehall release to allow the LEP's to proceed and when? I think we are all disappointed that the budget contained no news on how the government would allocate resources to regional LEPs, through the Heseltine Review.  These proposals will be a real game-changer for the West Midlands, and there are clearly internal battles going on in Whitehall as confirmed by Heseltine in terms of the size of the pot," says Thompson.

"Until this is decided, the LEPs for Greater Birmingham & Solihull, and for the Black Country remain uncertain about when they can begin to implement their ideas for growth and make them a reality.  And if you put this into context, we see that last month, of the 576 infrastructure projects highlighted by the government only seven have been completed. The country needs these schemes to be delivered and not log-jammed inside Whitehall.

In one of the liveliest Budgets in recent memory, chancellor George Osborne was at times lost for words. With the outlook for the economy significantly downgraded, some are saying that this is a Budget of paradoxes. For example, Britain will avoid a triple-dip recession after the return to negative growth in Q4 of 2012, but the economy is only likely to grow by 0.6% this year - a big fall from the 1.1% previously forecast.

The West Midlands region was fleetingly mentioned as Osborne confirmed the government's backing to Lord Heseltine's call for a 'single pot' of money for local enterprise and the country's 39 LEP's to share and promised to implement the proposal.

The Help to Buy scheme is welcomed but will it truly revitalise the housing market? And the announcement regarding £3.5bn investment in infrastructure is positive, but which schemes are set to benefit and how quickly?

As people digest the finer details from this afternoon's speech, here is some initial industry reaction:

Stephen Hemming, director, planning & development at Lambert Smith Hampton in Birmingham, welcomes the chancellor's announcement of £3.5bn support for infrastructure projects, but adds: "It is unfortunate that the spending won't come in until 2015/16, although it is appreciated that the money comes as a result of savings elsewhere. The question is what will be delivered and where? Will we see the big, potentially game changing schemes getting delayed by challenges as with HS2 or will it be the smaller, but in some cases no less important, projects such as new roads and so on which have been put on the back burner finally being dusted off."  

Jan Thompson, Jones Lang LaSalle's Birmingham-based Midland chairman also welcomes the £3bn spending on infrastructure and acceptance of a single pot for local enterprise but states "the key questions on everyone's lips - how much will Whitehall release to allow the LEP's to proceed and when? I think we are all disappointed that the budget contained no news on how the government would allocate resources to regional LEPs, through the Heseltine Review.  These proposals will be a real game-changer for the West Midlands, and there are clearly internal battles going on in Whitehall as confirmed by Heseltine in terms of the size of the pot," says Thompson.

"Until this is decided, the LEPs for Greater Birmingham & Solihull, and for the Black Country remain uncertain about when they can begin to implement their ideas for growth and make them a reality.  And if you put this into context, we see that last month, of the 576 infrastructure projects highlighted by the government only seven have been completed. The country needs these schemes to be delivered and not log-jammed inside Whitehall.

Here's a first look at how the interior of Shoosmith's new Birmingham operation will look - pretty snazzy eh?

Following on from yesterday's announcement by BOMF (Birmingham Office Market Forum) on the city centre's annual take-up figures which made for disappointing reading, I'm highlighting a positive.

With the total take-up for 2012 hitting 500,955 sq ft according to BOMF, this reflected a drop of one quarter (25%) compared to 2011's figure of 669,798 sq ft.

But a pre-Christmas highlight came in the form of the much talked about, but long-awaited signing (on 19th December - following the deal being tipped by EG earlier that month) of the deal between Nurton Development's and law firm Shoosmiths, for space at Nurton's 158,000 sq ft Two Colmore Square in the city centre.

In perhaps the worst kept secret in the city, Shoosmiths had been circling the scheme (and others - including Colmore Plaza) for some time and decided to make its base at Two Colmore Square by signing a 15-year lease on a rent of circa £25 per sq ft.

And now all Brum needs is a few more deals like that to see it through the cold winter months and into spring/summer. But how likely is that?

Well, according to the latest research by CBRE, Brum will see marginal growth in 2013, but expect to see rents flatline in 2014 as a consequence of new space coming to market during this year.

Jon Carmalt, director at Jones Lang LaSalle and keeper of the BOMF stats, agrees that the BOMF figures for 2012 were disappointing, but adds: "2012 got off to a very poor start in Q1 but improved throughout the year. When I compare the current enquiry schedules with those of exactly 12 months ago then the picture now is far healthier, with a reasonable volume of circa 20,000 - 50,000 sq ft enquiries demonstrating a range of existing occupiers who are at least considering their relocation options.

"Occupiers doing nothing and staying put is the local office market's biggest threat, but I feel certain that when we look back at this period then 2012 will be seen to have been the lowest point in Birmingham's office market."

Let's certainly hope so...