In an online event held by the Insurance Institute of London on 18 January 2022 Miles Celic, Chief Executive Officer of The CityUK, outlined his views on “How to make the UK the world’s leading international financial centre in five years”.
The CityUK is an industry body representing UK-based financial and related professional services. Mr Celic explained that, whilst the UK will never surpass New York as a domestic financial centre due to the sheer size of the US population, there is every reason to hope that London can reclaim the crown as the world’s leading financial centre – a position it lost to New York in 2018.
After outlining some of the achievements of UK financial and related professional services – 2.3 million jobs, 10% of domestic output, £79.3 billion trade surplus – he emphasised that London’s “clustering” of financial services businesses is unique in the world.
The thrust of his message was that, in order to achieve its goals, London must do more. That message echoes the thoughts of IM that we in the insurance industry must do more to promote our industry and explain to the general public the good that we do and how important we are to the entire economy.
Reg Brown, Chairman of IM, asked Mr Celic whether a World Class Insurance Visitor and Research Centre, supported by a Museum and Library in London EC3 would help, he confessed that he’d not thought about it, but agreed that The CityUK should look at it as it certainly would help their cause.
