Coventry 2021 Big Tent Ideas Festival focused on four key areas – Green Growth, Healthy Growth, Inclusive Growth and Global Connectivity. The discussions provoked a number of policy ideas, published as the Big Tent Big Ideas report.
Ben Rich, Chief Executive of Radix Big Tent, explains that the Festival “exposes us all to new ways of thinking and other people’s priorities and it is from such exposure that new and innovative ideas and solutions emerge.”
Key amongst the 16 ‘Big Ideas’ made at the Festival were:
- Data be collected on numbers and types of journeys made, to be used to name and shame places and neighbourhoods with the worst polluters.
- Communities that cut the cost of health or pollution bills be rewarded by having some of the money returned to them to be invested in their town or city, and for the community to have a say in how it is spent.
- NHS patients be invited to share health data anonymously making them eligible for the world’s most advanced new therapies and, providing millions of pounds worth of free drugs.
Leading blood cancer specialist Professor Charlie Craddock said: “It is our ethical duty to connect patients with these amazing treatments.”
With youth violence a major concern, Tyler Campbell proposed offering secure places for young people to relax and enjoy live music while business mentors helped them with finding jobs, writing CVs and other life skills, modelled on the experience Fridays in Coventry, which Tyler founded.
The Coventry 2021 Big Tent Ideas Festival attracted national & local leaders including Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng, Education Secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, both Labour & Conservative Mayoral Candidates for the West Midlands, Liam Byrne MP and Mayor Andy Street and leading backbenchers Jess Phillips and Layla Moran, as well as local businesses, policymakers, commentators and hundreds of members of the public.
