One media adviser I spoke to was fairly bemused why so many had turned up as “they had already written their stories” before arriving at the venue on the Merseyside.
And I think this is quite a telling statement for the mortgage industry to take on board for their interpretation of what came out of the conference. Sometimes what is covered in the media and even what is said in the main speeches is not a true reflection of the overall sentiment.
Vince Cable may have raged against capitalism and Nick Clegg may have bashed the bankers during their turn at the podium, but you need to remember that these are headline speeches – designed to make headlines and high level statements. They cannot include the nuance or subtlety that the conversations outside of the main hall contained.
And from those conversations my conclusion was that this was a party that was aware of the sensitivities surrounding our economy and understood the role that financial services has to play in maintaining stability. This is not the story the media thinks the people want and so it was underplayed.
But away from the cameras, there was no talk of bonuses or clamping down on financial services. Instead, people – many of whom will be influential in this government – spoke of the need to increase competition and diversity in our sector, they were open to input and acknowledged that to over-regulate would be to stifle recovery.
The headlines may tell us that this Coalition government wants to reduce the reliance our country has on financial services. What they don’t say is that this does not mean it wants to shrink financial services, but to build around it. And for that to be successful there needs to be a healthy and competitive lending environment – both for businesses and individuals.
It strikes me that while the headlines have moved on little in the past year, the political environment behind those headlines is slowly entering a new era.
