The following speech was given to the CBI's, Neglected Middle, fringe event at Conservative Party Conference on the 3rd of October. Thank you John. I have to admit that I am not a career politician and still think of myself as an entrepreneur and a businessman, with the personal experience of growing a mid-sized business and taking it public YouGov may have started with two of us in a shed, but today it’s a multi-national business, listed on the London stock exchange and with a turnover that places it right in the bracket we’re talking about this evening. Firstly I would like to touch just briefly on why generating growth is so important. We all know the economic situation that was left to us. An unbalanced economy and a record deficit. We are all used to hearing the fact that we are borrowing almost £150bn a year, But let’s put that in context. In the length of time it will take us to have this meeting, we will have borrowed more than the annual turnover of two mid-sized businesses. A stunning total of over £25 million. The deficit and the government’s plan to deal with it leads me on to the thrust of what I want to focus on in my opening remarks, and that is Leadership. We’ve led the world with our determination to tackle the deficit. And for taking that leadership the markets have rewarded us. We now borrow at the same rate as Germany despite having a budget deficit the same as that of Portugal’s. And of course this translates to lower borrowing costs for business as well as for households. But as we are seeing with countries like Greece, Portugal and even Italy, deficit reduction alone isn’t enough. If we are to smooth the waters of this choppy recovery we need to ensure that we also support sustainable growth in the private sector. The government has already taken action. The growth review identified the key areas we needed to improve on, on red-tape alone we’ve already removed over £350m worth, and at the same time we are cutting corporation tax to the lowest in the G7. We’ve established business led Local Enterprise Partnerships and put in place a £1.4bn regional growth fund. All of which helps the mid-sized enterprise as much as the SME or large corporation. It’s clear that medium sized businesses are too important to ignore. I’m therefore delighted that the Government is carrying out a review of the mid-sized sector as part of the second phase of the growth review, the policy results of which I am sure we will see in the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement. The Issues Before coming here I spoke to a number of mid-sized businesses in my own constituency who all broadly agreed with John on the key barriers affecting businesses of this size. Specifically they identified the lack of skilled People, the lack of Money, lack of Space, and lack of ambition to grow as key barriers. None of these are simple issues to solve, and any politician who tries to tell you otherwise is either naive or lying. The low hanging fruit of a tax cut, or a grant programme isn’t going to be the magic wand that makes them go away. Neither are they issues wholly owned by the Department of Business or the Treasury. People Let’s look at people. Regardless of whether you use an international benchmark, or just listen to the anecdotal evidence of business It’s now clear that “education, education, education” failed to deliver. Young people today are less prepared for the workplace, regardless of their level of qualification and grade inflation has only worsened the situation. And whilst Labour may have had the slogan, Michael Gove is now providing the leadership that the department for Education truly needed. Too many businesses today say that they are struggling to find not just people with the right skills but also the right attitude. That’s why we’re transforming the education landscape, freeing up schools from central control, and overhauling the national curriculum whilst making exams and qualifications more rigorous. Alongside this we’ve also funded a record number of apprenticeships, 365,000 of them. Of course getting the right people isn’t just about the youngest recruits, as John said, it’s also about management. A study of 9,000 medium business by the LSE and McKinsey found a productivity gap in the UK, which it put down to management capability. They found that in a medium enterprise a 20% improvement in management is the equivalent 65% increase in return on capital employed. Speaking to growing businesses in my constituency they also agree. The key to growth is having the right leaders. In short leadership matters. So we need to work out how we can support Medium enterprises to develop not just this generation of leaders, but the next generation as well. How can we extend business mentoring to ensure it is relevant and delivered by the right people, with the right skills and right knowledge? Space If a business grows it needs more space. It’s as simple as that, whether it’s for more people, or more machinery, a growing business expands its footprint. However most businesses that you speak to will tell you that the planning system is holding back their plans to grow. Under Labour the Planning system became a halt on business development, with over 1,000 pages of guidance and a system of costly appeals. That’s why we’re tearing up the 1,000 pages and replacing them with just 52. It’s not universally popular, something you may have noticed if you’re a Telegraph reader, but it is right. That’s what leadership is about. Taking the tough decisions that need to be taken. Business taking a leadership role Whilst Government can lead and legislate on some areas, business also needs to engage, own and lead. Whitehall won’t and can’t come up with all the solutions. That’s why I think Local Enterprise Partnerships are so important. LEPs are business led and making a real difference. They give businesses a way to take leadership of the problems, an avenue to tackle the blocks on growth, and a route to central government. Let me give you an example. In Coventry there is a fantastic business called CPP. They’re coach-builders. Now by that I don’t mean that they make passenger coaches. They hand build the best cars, using traditional techniques and the latest technology. At their factories they hand make limited edition Aston Martins, Bentleys, Range Rovers and Rolls Royces, a business they wanted to expand onto the historic ex-Jaguar site on Browns Lane. But the deal with the old RDA to purchase Browns lane had stalled under the weight of bureaucratic inertia. So they went to the LEP, which used it’s influence and connections to get the deal moving again and as a result car manufacturing will be returning to Browns Lane. Conclusion So what am I saying? I’m saying really that business has to get involved, they have to lead the change that we need. That isn’t to say government doesn’t have a role. We need to attack the red-tape, to lead on changing our planning system, to deliver the reforms of our education system, to lead the way in keeping the cost of government down, to provide the leadership and incentives that encourages business to invest. We need to do all that and more, but ultimately a big part of our job has to be to get out of the way and let business get on with it.