Fellow Liverymen
Since I last wrote to you at Easter we had the sad news of the death of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh. Prince Philip was a fantastic champion for the UK and the City of London over more than seven decades, and an active supporter of the Livery. He will be very much missed in the Square Mile, particularly by those Livery Companies with which he was especially associated. I am pleased that the Lord Mayor’s Appeal is working with The Duke of Edinburgh’s Awards Scheme, which is just one of the many remarkable legacies of a life well lived.
12th April saw the much-anticipated easing of lockdown restrictions and the return of non-essential retail and hospitality to the City’s streets. As part of our Reopening Campaign, supporting businesses and encouraging confidence in the return to work, I spent the week visiting shops and restaurants as they re-opened and office buildings as they welcomed back staff to the workplace in greater numbers.
Kicking off with a much-needed trim at a City barbers to tidy up the Mayoral tresses, I was able to visit:
- restaurants and pubs opening up their outside spaces to customers, including the Lamb Tavern in Leadenhall Market and Le Cordon Blue cookery school in Fleet Street;
- retailers in One New Change, Bow Lane and the Royal Exchange, including the Fortnum & Mason bar;
- office buildings including 22 Bishopsgate, the Leadenhall Building, JPMorgan’s City site, WeWork and insurance broker Howden Group, who have had the brilliant idea of giving all their staff a pre-loaded gift card to spend in local shops and restaurants to support the recovery;
- City churches St Mary Le Bow and St Mary Aldermary and my own livery company at Haberdashers’ Hall;
- as well as the vaccination and testing centres which are crucial to the return to work.
It was great to meet so many people who are keen to get back to business. The campaign continues over the coming weeks, with the next major staging post being 17 May, when indoor hospitality venues and visitor attractions will be permitted to reopen. Should you be in the City that afternoon you may spot me riding in a brewer’s dray drawn by two Shepherd Neame shire horses as we drive to the re-opening of the Old Dr Butler’s Head pub. We will also be marking this next phase with an LSO concert at the Barbican Centre and the re-opening of other landmark cultural attractions including Tower Bridge, the Tower of London and the Museum of London.
All of this activity leads towards what we hope will be the end of restrictions on 21 June. As we know, there has not been a United Guilds Service since 2019. However, in order for the Livery and City family to have an opportunity to gather together when permitted, I am planning a Service of Reflection and Hope to be held at St Paul’s Cathedral on Tuesday 22 June. I intend it to be a chance for us to reflect upon the year that has passed, to recognise those who have steered and supported communities through the pandemic, and to look ahead with a spirit of optimism. We are awaiting confirmation of what the next phase of Government guidelines means for the cathedral’s seating capacity, but I hope that every Livery company can be represented at the service. My team will contact companies when the details are finalised.
I have recently concluded the latest series of virtual coffee mornings with masters and clerks of the Livery, which provided an excellent forum for me to find out more about companies’ plans for a return to halls and in-person social activities, as well as to discuss the green agenda. What is very clear to me is the debt that the whole Livery owes to its Clerks and members of staff during the pandemic, who have managed to keep companies operational during a time of enormous upheaval and ongoing uncertainty. I am sure all of us in the Livery are grateful for the determination and imagination that the clerks and their teams have shown over the past year and wish to record my own admiration for all that they do. I am also pleased to have received nominations from Livery companies for my Lord Mayor’s COVID19 Awards, recognising the contribution of individual liverymen and staff during the pandemic. Recipients of the Awards will be contacted shortly and I hope to be able to meet them in a physical in-person presentation event after 21st June.
I like to use these bulletins to highlight some of the activities that are taking place across the Livery. One such inter-Livery event is a forthcoming Charities Conference organised by the Chartered Accountants Company on 17 May. The virtual conference will discuss charity governance issues, debate the success of charity responses to the social needs caused by the pandemic, and will allow participants to hear from the CEO of the Charity Commission about expectations for the recovery phase. Further information about the conference and booking details are available at: https://www.liverycommittee.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Livery-Charity-Conference-Invitation-and-Agenda-894fd64468fc52598a6f13179bfef018.pdf
A second pan-Livery project is Pollinating London Together, which seeks to improve the City’s open spaces and private planting for bees and other pollinators. Over twenty livery companies are already involved, and, alongside the City of London Corporation, are thinking about how to use courtyards, gardens and window boxes to provide a plentiful supply of nectar. I would encourage you to support this excellent initiative. More details here: https://www.liverycommittee.org/pollinating-london-together/
More broadly, to hear a little bit more about some of the other issues on which I am currently focussed I thought you might like to see these excerpts from an interview I recorded recently at Mansion House with CNBC. You can view parts of the interview at the links below:
- On sustainability: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5lIvK1cIgk
- On post-Covid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvyNNATEhqA
- On post- Brexit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByYb6EYySic
I hope that as the City continues to open up I will have the chance of seeing many of you soon. Until then, I send continued best wishes from me and the Lady Mayoress.
Alderman William Russell
The Rt Hon the Lord Mayor
