Chief Executive of Radix UK since 2019, Ben is a political strategist, writer and broadcaster. In 2021, he led the merger between Radix think tank and the Big Tent Ideas Festival and he continues to take overall responsibility for Radix Big Tent’s growing programme to promote system renewal.
Former Chief of Staff and Campaign Director for then Liberal Democrat Leader, Tim Farron MP, Ben was also previously Chief Executive of the Movement for Reform Judaism and prior to that a Partner at City Public Relations firm, Luther Pendragon.
1. New Capital Consensus was formally launched in February at an event with senior stakeholders, attracting over a hundred industry figures and speakers, including Dame Elizbeth Corley, Martin Wolf and Stephanie Flanders.
2. This was followed by NCC’s Parliamentary launch in partnership with the Fabians Economic Working Group and Pensions Minister, Torsten Bell MP.
3. Since then, NCC has published five major research reports,Reviving UK Investment Flows, Driving Investment for a Better Society, From Pensions to Prosperity, The Trillion Pound Question, and Effective Investment, all well received by policy makers and influencers.
4. The fifth report, Effective Investment, was launched in Parliament in November with Parliamentarians from the three main Parliamentary parties attending. This will be followed with a rearranged event at Chatham House, with the Pensions Minister early in the New Year.
5. Following meetings with around a dozen Parliamentarians from the three main Parliamentary parties, on 1st December, NCC launched its ParliamentaryInvestment System Council, including Treasury Committee members John Glen MP, John Grady MP, Bobby Dean MP, and SNP Chief Whip and Work and Pensions spokesperson, Kirsty Blackman MP. The ISC will act as a conduit for promoting systems thinking in Parliament and members are already using ISC briefings in debates.
6. Further one-to-one and roundtable meetings are being held with regulators, City and Pensions trade bodies, other think tanks and academics including influential figures such as Mervyn King, Sir Nick Lyons, Sam Woods, Andy Haldane and others.
7. Over the Autumn, NCC has hosted a series of workshopswith senior industry figureson risk transfer and the flow of finance overseas to further advise policy makers, successfully convening people such as Andrew Jones (Schroders), Frank Carson (Aviva), Rhiannon Price (Barclays), Anne Fairweather (Hargreaves Lansdown), Antony Manchester (BlackRock) and Miranda Seath (Investment Association) and well as leading economist, Vicky Pryce.
8. We have strengthened the NCC team to include Project Officer, Peter Hopwood, Parliamentary and Communications Officer, Francis Bell and Policy Adviser and former DWP civil servant, Gareth Thomas. Policy Director, Dan Hedley completes the team.
9. NCC has benefited from the advice at quarterly meetings of our outstanding Advisory Panel, chaired by Sir Keith Skeoch, former CEO of Standard Life Aberdeen, and including Katherine Braddick, Lord David Pitt-Watson, Paul Johnson and others.
10. We continue to grow our traditional and social media presence, includingcoverage of Reviving UK Investment Flows in the Daily Telegraph, and Effective Investment in POLITICO, alongside our Director, Ashok Gupta’s thought-piece in LabourList - widely read by Labour MPs. NCC also produced an educational animation to visualise the investment chain to support the communication of policy recommendations.
11. We are now generating 3,300 website visits per month with an average visit time of 6m 28s, and 2000 impressions per month on LinkedIn, up 582% over the past month. A podcast on Effective Investment has also been recorded and is in the editing phase.
12. We have attracted £400k plus in unrestricted funding from four different Foundations.
