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LONDON TO BUILD NEW £300M CONFERENCE FACILITY

The Times, 21st October 2005
By Jenny Davey

The London Development Agency (LDA) yesterday unveiled plans to build a £300 million state-of-the-art conference centre in the heart of London’s West End, in an attempt to woo business visitors back to the capital.

The plans, backed by Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London are designed to challenge rival convention venues in Europe including the Palais de Congrès in Paris, and make London the leading destination for business conventions.

In the 1970s London was the top venue in Europe for large international conferences, but it has slipped rapidly to a ranking of 19th.

Conference Call

Growth in International Association conference
meetings in 1991 – 2003

Source: Union of International Associations

Gerry Acher, chair of an Independent commission set up by Me Livingstone to investigate the need for a new convention centre said the real loser if London developed a new convention centre would be Paris. The French capital regularly attracts business visitors from London with special discounted packages on Eurostar trains.

The LDA said there were more than 1,000 business conventions of 500 people or more, that travel around Europe which had not been to London for 20 years.

The agency believes that if London does not build a convention centre it will fail to capitalise on a rash of post-Olympic conventions that would otherwise be expected to take place in the capital.

Under the plans proposed by the LDA, the new International Convention Centre (ICC) would be designed to host major international conferences and events with a main auditorium capacity of between 3,000 and 5,000, as well as exhibition space, a large banquet facility and break-out rooms.

It would cost between £250 million and £300 million to build but the LDA claim it would provide a £400 million-a-year boost to the UK economy and create at least 5,500 new jobs. It is hoped the new venue could host 330 meetings and 70 banquets each year.

Mr Acher said he hoped to secure about half of the funds to build the venue from hotel groups and other business who would benefit from rising visitor members. He believed the venue would be operational two years before the 2012 Olympics.

So far the LDA has not identified a site for the new convention centre but Livingstone recently suggested that Oxford Street could be suitable. He is keen to ensure the sight is close to London’s theatres and restaurants to ensure the maximum economic benefit from tourists. Mr Acher said that London suffers because its venues including the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre in Westminster, are too small and turn away business.

The ExCel venue, in London’s docklands is still loss-making, but it is highly cash generative and has attracted over 1500 events in the five years since it opened with over three million visitors from 193 different countries.