We have a very strong relationship with the Kingdom that goes back a long time. I will be the fifth Lord Mayor that has made a point of coming here in recent years to promote the businesses that we can partner together with Saudi Arabia. I have got a very strong delegation with me and we will be exploring ways in which we can do better business.THE Lord Mayor of the City of London, Michael Bear, recently visited Jeddah and Riyadh with a large business delegation. He is the 683rd Lord Mayor, a position that was first recorded over 800 years ago in 1189. Although it is an extremely demanding and unsalaried role, he is delighted to have been elected: “You reach a point in your career when you want to put something back, so this is the best unpaid job in the world. To have the opportunity and the privilege to even be considered for this position is something that one dreams about. To be elected, I had to persuade my peers that I satisfied the three main criteria that they now look for in the Lord Mayor: you have to be at the top of your career; you have to have a very good understanding of the Business City and the Financial City, because you are Ambassador for that City; and the third one is that you have to have the gravitas to be an Ambassador. I was very fortunate and I satisfied those three and I was then elected by the Livery Companies – and that is how it works in the City.” Although his title is very formal, the Lord Mayor is not intimidating and our interview at the British Consulate-General proceeded in a relaxed atmosphere. The fact that he was born in Kenya (as I was) and that he attended Clifton College in Bristol (where my own two children went to school) certainly helped to break the ice when we met. After Clifton College, Bear studied engineering at Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg, followed by an MBA at Cranfield University in the UK. He made his home in London 32 years ago because, he said, “I have always regarded London as a centre of everything I ever enjoyed about life: culture, education and business.” He has worked in the construction and regeneration sector for 38 years and during his tenure as Lord Mayor, he has his three directorships with Balfour Beatty Property Ltd. Hammerson plc, and Arup on hold: “I am on a sabbatical from them so that makes me impartial – the Ambassador can't be partisan either to a company or to a sector.” The City of London is one of the world's leading international finance centres and the role of the Lord Mayor of the City of London is to be the Ambassador for all UK-based financial and professional services. Usually, the Lord Mayor comes from a financial background, but Bear's background is in construction. “Whenever you work in construction, in either UK or overseas, you are a client of financial services. So I come from the demand side,” he explained. “There is not a service in the City that I haven't used: we insure; we finance; we use design professional services, we swap, we hedge, we trade in currency. So it actually matches quite well with the role of promoting the industry because as a user, I know generally what people want.” During his year as Lord Mayor, he is faced with a punishing schedule: he will spend roughly 90 days travelling, visiting around 23 countries and on these overseas missions will be treated as a Cabinet-level minister. Over the 12 months, he will address some 10,000 people face-to-face each month, and has to deliver 700 speeches. Prior to taking office, he will have had some training in speech delivery, and although he takes an active role in writing his speeches, he has an official speechwriter. He explained his role further: “We live in interesting times. There has been a lot of ‘banker bashing' and so part of my role is not only to promote the City of London as the pre-eminent center for finance and business, but to promote a better understanding in the UK of what an important industry it is. It contributes 10 percent of our GDP, and £54 billion of tax revenues come from the City to the Exchequer to pay for schools, hospitals and roads. So I see my role as making sure that the country understands the importance of the industry as an engine for growth and for growing us out of the recession.” THE delegation of senior representatives that accompanied him to Saudi Arabia covered investment banking, asset management, insurance, law firms, Education and Training Qualifications (ETQ), and Knowledge Transfer. The Lord Mayor gave a summary of what he hoped to achieve during his visit: “One of the most important things is to further the business relationship. We have a very strong relationship with the Kingdom that goes back a long time. I will be the 5th Lord Mayor that has made a point of coming here in recent years to promote the businesses that we can partner together with Saudi Arabia. I have got a very strong delegation with me and we will be exploring ways in which we can do better business. The bilateral trade is about £6 billion a year – about £4 billion a year from the UK to Saudi, and about £2 billion from Saudi to the UK. There is about £17.5 billion of investment by UK companies in the Kingdom, with over 200 joint ventures, so we have got a wonderful building block on which to work and improve upon. My job is to meet local people here and to make sure that we have got the ingredients for improving our trading relationships. I have not been here before, so this is a great opportunity.” On his tours around the world, Bear is particularly looking forward to visiting two African countries: “My family is South African and it will be amazing to be back there as Lord Mayor. My old University, Witwatersand, has invited me to give a lecture there. I am also visiting the country of my birth which is Kenya,” (he pronounces it in the old-fashioned way, Keenya) “so I will be the first Lord Mayor of London to go to Nairobi for a long time. I will also go to Nigeria, and to Angola which is a new market that our Minister of Trade particularly wants me to visit.” Accompanying the Lord Mayor is Alderman and Sheriff Fiona Woolf CBE. She is one of two Sheriffs of the City of London and is the first female one to come to Saudi Arabia, although she has previously worked in Riyadh. Before anyone can stand for the role of Mayor, they have to have served as a Sheriff. “There have only been two other female Sheriffs before me – the first was Mary Donaldson back in 1981 and she became the first female Lord Mayor in 1983. Subject to the process, I hope to be the Court of Alderman's candidate for Lord Mayor in 2013, but it takes a lot of preparation, as the Lord Mayor will tell you.” “It's a piece of cake!” the Lord Mayor laughed, “We are looking forward to having our second lady Lord Mayor – and she is called the Lord Mayor – in 821 years.” ONE of the great ‘perks' that comes with the role is to live in Mansion House, a rare surviving Georgian town palace in the City of London. “We have come from a small house in Finchley, so to live there with all the art, heritage and history is wonderful,” said Bear, “When I wake up in my apartment in the morning, it is what I call a ‘pinch yourself moment'. And my commuting time to work has decreased from 37 minutes to 37 seconds – that's when the lift is working!” Despite a hectic work schedule that begins in the office at 7.30 AM and rarely ends before mid-night, with one day off at the weekends if he is lucky, the Lord Mayor is enthusiastic about his new role: “I enjoy it all!” he said with gusto, “The variety is amazing. I have always been busy in business, and the economic environment we are in at the moment is a challenge. We are coming out of recession and to be involved in that momentum, pursuing the prime minister's and the government's strategy of commercial diplomacy, of creating jobs and opportunities through trade, is a real privilege. So this is a pinnacle of my career. I don't know what I am going to do next!” he said laughing, “Go back to my ‘day job' and living in Finchley!”
