23/01/2017 Midlands Today

The Midlands could rival London for business output -

that's the encouraging message from the Chancellor, Philip Hammond,

on the day the Government launched its industrial strategy

The Prime Minister is already committed to growing the Midlands

economy by ?34 billion by 2030 and creating an extra 300,000 jobs

Today she shared her plans for how to make it happen.

Here's our business correspondent, Peter Plisner.

With the post-Brexit warning sirens still sounding and business

still cautious about the long-term impact of leaving the EU, today's

industrial strategy couldn't have come at a better time.

It is designed to help small businesses like this,

which makes warning lights and klaxons, plan for the future.

Vic, who is in charge of dispatches, is due to retire in a

few years' time, but even he thinks it is the right way forward.

I've only four years to go before I retire, but long-term,

for my kids and grandkids, obviously it is important.

Here, directly or indirectly, they supply goods to most

of the sectors being supported by this new industrial strategy,

and hopefully that will mean further expansion in the future

The new strategy aims to encourage growth by focusing

on investments in science, upgrading infrastructure and helping

increase both exports and inward investments.

But up in the board room, the company's commercial director

What is important for us is to make sure

that it has got crossbench support with Labour,

and it doesn't change every four years when we get a new Government.

We want investments lasting ten, 15 years.

Unless we can plan for that, anything less than

Elsewhere, this leading businesswomen, whose

firm makes equipment for the construction

industry, whilst welcoming the strategy, is worried that today

there was no mention of the Midlands Engine.

There is such a great industry in the Midlands.

We've got huge construction projects, huge manufacturing,

so let's hope they haven't forgotten about us.

Nearly 10% of the UK's small and medium-sized

businesses are based in the West Midlands,

and the success of the new strategy will be measured in part

More importantly, how many jobs they will

Joan Cummins is at the Manufacturing Technology Centre in Coventry.

Is the Midlands right to be nervous that it's been overlooked?

Businesses are always nervous until everything

is signed on the dotted line, but today the Chancellor,

We will be announcing our Midlands Engine strategy in due

course, and we will be setting out how we're going to

approach in the Midlands that we're already working on in the

In the Midlands area, there are 11 million people,

and if we can get that area operating as an effective

marketplace, it will rival and even exceed the power of London.

I am joined by the chief executive of this centre, Clive Hickman. Are

you nervous at the Midlands engine may be overlooked? I don't think it

will be. It think it was clear in the Green paper that was issued

today that the Midlands engine structure he will follow closely

behind the Northern powerhouse strategy. What will that actually

mean for us? It gives us a great opportunity, us working together to

improve productivity and growth in the Midlands. What we want to know

about is jobs. Will we see them or is it high in the sky? I think there

will be more jobs. The improvement in productivity and economy growth

will lead to more jobs. We all want to see more jobs. We understand the

Government started -- strategy will be published in the next few months

and we will know exactly how much will be plowed here into the

Midlands. Back to you. Thank you. 100 rural communities are to benefit

from life-saving medical equipment. The Four Acres Trust

is offering funding to help pay for defibrillators,

which can shock the heart back Ambulance crews were called to deal

with 14,000 cardiac arrests in the West Midlands last year,

with survival rates at just 8%. Ian Hough knows he is lucky

to be alive, but there His story, dramatised

in a video, has a happy ending because when he collapsed

with a cardiac arrest, first-aiders were on hand,

equipped with a defibrillator It means I can still carry

on with life as normal. There is nothing different that I do

now that I didn't do prior Yeah, they are just

a fantastic bit of kit. Ambulance crews and first

responders have them, too. But in remote areas,

it can take a lot longer To have a distributor

in the community, available 24/7, -- defibrillator, to be

able to train people an awareness session of how

to a defibrillator is A rural charity is putting up

?50,000 and asking communities to raise the same again to pay

for 100 new defibrillators. To some extent they are reliant

on first responders getting to an incident first, and

the ambulance arrives a little bit later, hopefully not too much later,

and that is why we are backing Ian is into the sixth year

of his extra lease of life, and should a crisis arise again,

his boat club is now properly The Midlands Canal Network

is looking for more volunteers They've been part of life on our

waterways for hundreds of years. But they're in short supply,

so a campaign has been launched to find people who can help keep

the tradition alive. Nestled in the heart of Worcester,

the canals have been an integral Jo is one of a band of volunteer

lock keepers whose job it It is about helping people, talking

to people and helping them find out what is happening in the area. You

have people who don't know the area, where is the best curry house or the

best morning, but just generally chatting to be but walking through.

This is where the canal network meets the river.

It is also one area where new volunteers are needed.

This is the first 58 locks across the stretch of the canal.

There are currently 40 volunteer lock keepers here, but

they're hoping to double that number to enhance more people's journey

They get a briefing, but if you're new to it

Knowing there is a volunteer lock keeper

there to be supportive when you need it.

The days of industty might be gone, now the canaled prosperity

comes from a different type of trade.

This cafe relies on the canal, and the owners know what an

important role the lock keepers play.

The tourist industry is very important to Worcester,

so they are helping with

that and it helps with the economics of the area.

A profession steeped in history and heritage, anyone who

would like to volunteer and try their hand at

Six army reservists from the Midlands have completed

a 1,100 mile journey across Antarctica,

a feat only ever achieved by a handful of people.

The team called Spear 17, are raising money

They finished their expedition in 66 days.

Their journey on foot took them via the South Pole.

I'll leave you with the weather forecast from Shefali Oza.

Thank you very much. Good evening. Today's fog was not the only thing

getting a lot of you talking. It was also this evening's fiery sunset

which gradually started to fizzle out towards the end of the day. This

is how the rest of the week is looking. Cold, frosty and foggy,

mostly dry and then milder by the weekend. As far as the fog is

concerned for tonight, we have a warning in place for that for dense

freezing fog which could be quite widespread. If we look at it on the

chart, it is like a big ball of cotton wool, developing very quickly

and we have a widespread frost as temperatures dipped to minus four

Celsius here in the Southwest. That is how you start the day, on a

foggy, frosty note. Tricky driving conditions around, take care. That

will gradually lift, we will see pleasant spells of sunshine in the

afternoon. Temperatures ranging from 5-7 C. Tomorrow night we do not have

as much fog because we have more cloud. That is going to keep

temperatures above freezing, so we do not have frost either, working

both ways. It will be a mild night, not as cold as today, temperatures

for most listeners down to around one or two Celsius, but as we head

into Wednesday, it means it will be a cloudy start to the day and that

cloud starts to break up, revealing some decent spells of sunshine by

the time we get to the afternoon. Temperatures ranging from around six

- seven agree Celsius. Looking ahead, it is the southerly

southeasterly breeze that will introduce colder air by the time we

get to Thursday. It looks as though it will be a westerly on the

surface, but it's originating from the South East and it means we will

see more in the way of the sunshine, so Thursday is the best day for

sunshine, cloudy or on Friday with spots of rain.

For the weekend we will have dry weather with sunny spells and it

will be a little bit milder. Good evening. We are continuing to

see huge righty in the weather. Getting the detail right is proving

to be a challenge. This was in Pembrokeshire and other parts of the

UK were gloomy throughout the day. The fog is thickening up right now.

Particularly pool on the M5 in south-west England. Very foggy

across parts of the West Country. This fog is tending to spread its

way further