In this very special episode of City Talks Andrew Carter is joined by the Centre for Cities' now former Director of Policy and Research, Paul Swinney, to reflect on his 16 years at the Centre for Cities as he moves on to his next adventure. They discuss what's changed, and what hasn't, in the last two decades in the world of economic policy, what brought Paul to the Centre 16 years ago as well as some of his favourite moments during his tenure.

Centre for Cities’ Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Rt Hon Greg Clark, member of the Industrial Strategy Advisory Council and former Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

With Government’s Industrial Strategy White Paper published, Greg explains what the Advisory Council will do next and how industrial policy relates to other area of the Government’s growth plan.

This episode is part of Centre for Cities’ City Talks series. Please rate, review and share the episode if you enjoyed it.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Matt Clancy, Senior Programme Officer at Open Philanthropy and the creator of New Things Under the Sun, a living literature review on social science research about innovation. Drawing on Matt's interest in science, innovation and technology they discuss hybrid working, productivity, cities and the future of work.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Paul Swinney, Director of Policy and Research, to discuss the findings of our latest report 'Checking out: The varying performance of high streets across the country'. They dive into why high streets perform differently from city to city and what can be done to further improve successful high streets and turn around the centres most struggling.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Tom Aubrey, Founder of Credit Capital Advisory and Visiting Senior Fellow at LSE, and Maurice Lange, Analyst at Centre for Cities. Drawing on Tom's knowledge of financing housing and infrastructure in the UK they discuss how to deliver projects at the scale of a new town, looking at the organisation and coordination of a project as well as the funding.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Victoria Sutherland, Deputy Director of Evidence at the What Works Centre for Local Economic Growth to discuss their recent rapid evidence review on Enterprise Zones. The need for an evidence-backed approach is all the more relevant as Government's new Industrial Strategy puts a 'zone' approach at the centre of its plan for growth with Investment Zones and Freeports becoming Industrial Strategy Zones and new AI Growth Zones being announced.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Paul Swinney, Director of Policy and Research, for the Centre for Cities’ first reflections on today’s Industrial Strategy. They run through the documents pros and cons including what it means for the big city regions that sit at the heart of the plan as well as the elected mayors that represent them.

Chief Executive Andrew Carter is joined by Jake Nunley, City Specialist, and James Child, Head of Research, for ING Media, strategic communications specialists for the built world. They discuss city branding, how it's changing in a digital world and the implications of these changes for what cities do and should be doing. They also draw on findings from ING's flagship reports 'Most Talked About Cities' which look not at what cities say about themselves but what the world is saying about them.