Claire Hensman, Lord Lieutenant Cumbria

I was a University Board member for nine years until 2019 and during that time the university recovered from a failing institution to the success story it is today under its dynamic management. It now has an excellent reputation in the county and is seen as a can-do institution accelerating in the delivery of its original remit as a high class educational and research resource for the county. What is striking is the steady building of a reputation for responsive partnership working, with a stream of new initiatives with employers: large businesses such as BAE and Sellafield and high-tech SMEs, but also the public services locally and nationally; the NHS, emergency services and the Police, the Armed Forces, and Teacher Training. There is now a culture among the management at all levels to reach out into the community to engage with societal and environmental issues and projects and to adapt and deliver programmes in response.

I am optimistic that although it will take time to break the cycle of deprivation and low aspiration (from years of decline of mining and heavy industry on the Cumbrian West Coast and in Barrow) steadily the efforts of the university and its partners, particularly through accessible apprenticeship schemes, will upskill the workforce. The need for a home-grown workforce and the imperative to stem the haemorrhaging of our young talent out of the county has never been greater: we need to populate with skilled people the Dreadnought and Aukus submarine programmes in Barrow, probable nuclear SMRs at Moorside, repairing the labour shortages in rural medicine and our remote hospitals, not forgetting also the environmental pressures on our World Heritage Site. All these require skills that the university is gearing itself up, with its partners, to provide.

The £78m move of the main campus to the centre of Carlisle will be a game-changer for the university and the city. The university’s initiatives with prestigious partners such as Imperial College London and Lancaster University’s Management School will further enhance its academic credentials. The new campus in Barrow supporting BAE Systems Submarines is another important investment and profile raiser in the local population.

The Vice-Chancellor has built a strong management team. They are creating a resourceful and forward-looking institution helping to change perceptions, external and internal, of our county as a remote borderland. These are potentially exciting times for Cumbria and the university is now one of the main drivers, building capacity to take advantage of the opportunities to bring prosperity for all our people.