Herefordshire & Worcestershire Chamber of Commerce is working with local organisations to examine the current labour market and lead change to continue to support businesses to thrive and grow.
The Chamber is delighted to share that the Quarterly Economic Survey report for the first quarter of 2019 is now live. The report has been generated based on feedback from over 600 businesses in the region that completed the QES earlier this year.
Regionally, it has allowed us to highlight the key concerns that businesses in Herefordshire and Worcestershire are facing – helping us to prioritise our main policy concerns for the year. Nationally, the two counties’ high engagement with the survey means that our region represents 10% of British Chambers of Commerce’s report.
Having such high engagement rates means the top concerns identified are representative of the majority of businesses in the region, meaning that the Chamber can continue to lobby on behalf of firms at both a local and national level.
Poppy Bramford, Policy Manager at the Chamber, recently met with Robin Walker MP, to discuss the main business concerns highlighted in the latest report.
For the first quarter of the year, the Chamber partnered with the Worcestershire Local Enterprise Partnership through the ‘Creating Our Future Workforce Campaign’. The joint venture was formed to provide an additional focus to the quarterly economic survey report, investigating the extent to which the Worcestershire labour market is comprised of an ageing workforce.
The report also looks into topics like cash flow, recruitment challenges, export projections and price pressures felt by the local business community. Despite demonstrating impressive resilience during 2018, the findings from this report show that persistent political and economic uncertainty has forced businesses to slam on the breaks.
To view a copy of the report, please visit our website here www.bit.ly/QESQ119.
To request a hard copy of the results from quarter 1, please contact Poppy Bramford, Policy Manager, on PoppyB@hwchamber.co.uk.