LOCATION New York, New York

SPEAKER British Ambassador Nigel Sheinwald

EVENT Transatlantic Business Awards Dinner

DATE November 04, 2009

Full text of British Ambassador Sir Nigel Sheinwald's remarks at the Transatlantic Business Awards Dinner in New York City on 3 November 2009.

    Read the full speech

I am delighted to be back at the Transatlantic Business Awards Dinner. It is also a pleasure to be here for the first time with Ambassador Susman. He is an excellent colleague, and he and Marjorie have already made their mark in London.  

This dinner is a great tribute to our business partnership, and to the continuing success of BritishAmerican Business. I am delighted that you are still supporting it in such large numbers.

In the news these days, much of the focus is on the rise of China, India and Brazil, and their growing clout is important. But so is Europe. The economic relationship between the United States and the European Union remains by far the largest, most complex and most important in the world. EU investment in the United States is a key driver of economic growth, together totaling 54% of the world’s GDP.  In 2008, EU Foreign Direct Investment stock in the US amounted to $1.43 trillion. By comparison, Indian FDI stock in the US was just $4.5 billion, and Chinese FDI stock was only $1.2 billion. Similarly, US investment in Europe is sixteen times more than in all of the BRIC countries combined. Those facts will change over time, but are going to be with us for the foreseeable future.

The British-American relationship is a critical part of this. British companies are the largest foreign investors in the US. The US is No.1 investor in the UK. In the last fiscal year alone, there were 621 new US investment projects in the UK, which created nearly 13,000 jobs and amounted to 36% of total inward investment to Britain.  

But these challenging times demand ever stronger international cooperation. Since our last dinner, we have had three G20 Summits, hosted in the UK and US, which have set a clear agenda for financial sector reform that we continue to support. Despite the turmoil, the City of London and New York remain strong, with an unrivalled concentration of capital, capabilities and infrastructure.  

The world economy will not recover unless we remain vigilant about defending free trade. Thankfully, we have avoided a catastrophic tariff on a par with Smoot-Hawley. But according to the latest report issued in September, G20 members have applied a range of smaller trade-restricting measures, which may be legal but have a “trade-chilling” effect.  

These protectionist measures risk slowing economic recovery. None of us is blameless. We need to face down the protectionists and have the courage to complete the Doha Round of international trade negotiations. And, we must work to secure a global agreement at Copenhagen to combat climate change in order to ensure that our future growth is sustainable.  

So cooperation, more than ever, is essential to our future, and we need leaders who understand that. That is why this evening, it is my great pleasure, on behalf of British American Business, to present its US Transatlantic Business Award for 2009 to an outstanding person, who is in many ways the epitome of the New York/London brand of BritishAmerican business leadership.

Tom Glocer’s bachelor’s degree is from Columbia, and he has strong roots in this city. He left it for London in 2001, to take over as Reuters CEO. And now he’s back home, having led the successful combination of the businesses of the Thomson Corporation and Reuters.

When he was in London, he transformed Reuters; and through the merger with Thomson, he has created a remarkable company that represents one of the world’s leading sources of intelligent information for businesses and professionals.

Like Peter Sands, he has successfully combined this business with a major commitment to corporate citizenship: this has been recognized in many ways, including the inclusion of ThomsonReuters in the World’s Most Ethical Companies and the FTSE4Good Index.

He is also an active member of many Boards, including the Partnership for New York City and BritishAmerican Business.  

He writes a blog that is intelligent and funny, and that lists a wide range of cultural interests, from Camus and Dostoevsky to Coldplay and Pink Floyd. Being a modest man, he knows that, ultimately, we’re all just bricks in the wall. But this award is a genuine recognition of outstanding achievement. Ladies and Gentlemen, please join me and BritishAmerican Business in honoring an exceptionally talented business leader, Tom Glocer.

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