LONDON: The UK government hosts international business leaders on Monday to try and secure much-needed investment for Britain but the build-up has been chaotic with a major firm reportedly threatening to shelve a project.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the leader of the new Labour government, hopes the International Investment Summit in London will show the UK is “the best place in the world to do business”.

Starmer has been in power for just three months after securing a thumping majority in the general election.

But he is already on the back foot, with a YouGov poll showing only 18 per cent of Britons approve of his government’s record to date.

Labour sees Monday’s event as an opportunity to demonstrate its pro-business agenda and to stabilise the economy after 14 years of chaotic Conservative rule and Britain’s departure from the European Union.

Starmer is expected to announce billions of pounds in investments.

He has already unveiled £24 billion ($31.4bn) in green energy projects, including £12bn by Spanish giant Iberdrola and £8bn by Danish firm Orsted.

But his attempts to woo investors suffered a blow when an expected announcement by P&O Ferries of a £1bn port expansion was reported by UK media to be under threat.

This came after Transport Minister Louise Haigh and Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner issued a joint press release calling P&O’s employment practices “unscr­u­pulous” and “exploitative”.

Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, the chairman of P&O owner DP World, then threatened not to attend the investment summit.

Last-ditch talks with the UK government ensued and the Times reported on Saturday that bin Sulayem would take part after all and an announcement about the P&O investment was still expected.

‘Out-of-office’

Starmer has placed great importance on the summit and will open the event in conversation with Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google.

Yet he has struggled to attract the top names.

While around 200 private sector executives are expected to attend, many multinational bosses and tech-titans have decided to give it a miss.

Even the opportunity to meet King Charles III at the closing reception, planned for Monday evening, failed to convince them.

In a critical article on Friday, the Financial Times partly attributed the summit’s poor turnout to concerns over its “quality and organisation”.

Five days before the event, the start time and venue had still not been confirmed, added the FT.

Published in Dawn, October 13th, 2024