Rt. Hon. Rachel Reeves MP delivers the 2024 Mais Lecture at Bayes Business School
Ensuring economic stability, driving investment in partnership with business, and reforming public services and the labour market form the three key pillars for growth, according to the Rt. Hon. Rachel Reeves MP, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer as she delivered the 36th annual Mais Lecture at Bayes Business School (formerly Cass) on Tuesday 19 March 2024.
In her speech, titled ‘Economic Growth in an Age of Insecurity’, Ms Reeves laid out her blueprint for creating a sustained cycle of growth in the face of global challenges – in what she describes as a necessary “fundamental course correction”.
The event was livestreamed across various broadcast networks, and attended in-person by 200 business and finance leaders, staff, students, alumni and friends of Bayes Business School and City, University of London, and members of the media.
Following Ms Reeves’ speech, Professor Barbara Casu, Deputy Dean and Director of the Centre for Banking Research at Bayes, chaired an audience Q&A which focused on balancing stability and change, lessons to be learnt from President Joe Biden’s programme in the United States, levels of trade union support of Labour Party policy and the role of economic institutions in dictating UK growth.
On delivering the Mais Lecture, Rachel Reeves said:
“It was an enormous privilege to deliver this year’s Mais Lecture and I am grateful to Bayes Business School for hosting me at a time that I consider to be an important juncture for Britain.
“The Mais Lecture has an important place in our economic and political history. To look back on past lectures is to trace the revision of old ideas, the development of new ideas, and policymakers grappling with some of the big challenges we've faced over the last half century.
"It was an honour to present Labour’s vision to reverse managed decline: a plan to drive investment, remove the barriers constraining our productive capacity, and to build broad-based, inclusive, and resilient growth for communities across our country."
Professor André Spicer, Dean of Bayes Business School, said:
“It was an honour to welcome Rachel Reeves to Bayes to deliver this year’s Mais Lecture.
“As a leading global business school in the City of London, we are committed to developing future business leaders who will help drive economic growth at the heart of this year’s lecture.
“Bayes Business School’s continued commitment to hosting one of the most important banking and finance events in London, and ability to attract leading economic thinkers, underlines our status in the City and the expertise of our community.”
Professor Barbara Casu said:
“It was very pleasing to meet and hear from the Shadow Chancellor about an important topic of creating growth and navigating global uncertainty to avoid economic stagnation.
“Maintaining stability through change, and enabling private sector productivity alongside government input are both crucial ingredients to managing growth, as is the debate on how to achieve this.”
The Mais Lecture is widely regarded as the City of London’s headline event for London’s finance community, Since its inception in 1978, it has maintained a tradition of prestigious speakers, including previous Governors of the Bank of England, Chancellors of the Exchequer, future Prime Ministers, and Heads of the International Monetary Fund, the Federal Reserve.
Read Rachel Reeves’ Mais Lecture in full.
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