Mary brings Culture Secretary to West London creative industries roundtable

On Thursday, Local MP Mary Macleod brought together senior representatives of West London creative industries and the Culture Secretary, Rt Hon Maria Miller MP, at a roundtable event hosted by SEGA at their Brentford HQ. The roundtable centred on how to make West London even more of a world hub for the creative industries.

The roundtable was attended by representatives from fifteen different companies, including Sky, Discovery Networks and the BBC, as well as smaller companies such as Loft London. The roundtable comes as new figures show that creative industries is the fastest growing sector of the economy, worth over £70 billion each year.

The Culture Secretary talked about how important creative industries are to London and the UK as a whole, including what the Government was doing to support them.  The contributions to the roundtable included:-

• Jurgen Post, Chief Executive of Sega, explained why they had chosen Brentford for their European Headquarters and what the Government could do to encourage Sega to invest further in the area. 
• Jo Twist, Chief Executive of the industry body UK Interactive Entertainment, gave her thoughts on the issues that games companies face.
• Susanna Dinnage, Managing Director of Discovery Networks, talked about the broadcast industry and what more could be done to make sure investment stays in the UK.

Speaking after the event, Mary expressed her wish for an ‘ongoing conversation’ with creative industry leaders:

“Creative industries are increasingly important to our economy and here in West London we have so many doing great work, along with employing many thousands of people. I want to make sure that this is an ongoing conversation, so we can keep in touch with what the industry needs in order to grow now and in the future”.

Rt Hon Maria Miller, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, said:

“Whether it is broadcasting, video games, music or software development, the wealth of creative talent in West London is really impressive. This Government is ensuring this success story continues, with new tax incentives for TV, animation and video games. But there is always more that we can do. One of the best ways to do this is to listen and speak directly to industry leaders, such as the roundtable Mary organised last week. The businesses I spoke to were full of good ideas and they provided much food for thought”.