A statement from Paul Thandi, Chief Executive of the NEC Group regarding COVID-19

 *In response to the confirmation that the NEC is set to become an NHS field hospital*

“We have been working with our brilliant NHS and the MOD to plan, build and open a field hospital as quickly as possible, to help combat the life-threatening situation our country faces in dealing with COVID-19.  We will now offer the necessary resource and assistance in adapting the NEC appropriately, ready for imminent use. 

 “With the full and ongoing support of Blackstone, our majority shareholder, we are confident we can play our part to assist our NHS and MOD in our country’s efforts to combat the threat to life COVID-19 represents.” 

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As COVID-19 has spread around the world, the impact has been devastating to us all.  The most serious consequence is clearly that of public health and our hearts go out to those who have been and continue to be personally affected by this tragedy. 

The impact on business has been equally devastating and the travel, hospitality, leisure and live events sectors have been particularly hard hit. 

As we face these unprecedented times, we established three clear priorities:

• Protect the health and well-being of our employees and our workplaces as much as possible
• Continue to support the needs of our customers, visitors and commercial partners and suppliers, again, as much as possible
• Ensure that the live events sector can weather the storm and continue to drive the UK economy

To protect employees, we have implemented remote work and social distancing measures.   Those able to work from home are now operating remotely and their resilience, motivation and commitment is humbling.  We have stopped all non-essential travel and we are taking advantage of technology and holding employee meetings virtually.

For staff who are unable to work remotely we have reduced the density of the employee population at our sites and we’re taking preventive measures that allow these facilities to continue to operate safely, protecting the health and safety of our employees.

I want to thank our staff for everything they are doing to help each other, our business and our customers, as we all personally adjust to this unprecedented situation.

For customers, we are working around the clock with exhibition and conference organisers and event promoters to reschedule events to dates later in the year.  We understand that this has an impact right through the supply chain.  The economics of live events are far reaching and alongside our staff and customers there is a huge business community who depend on these events for economic survival; from exhibitors who rely on events to sell their products and services; to customers; through to the hospitality market that benefits from the business and leisure tourism that events create.

In the live events sector, we are working with our industry organisations AEV, AEO, ESSA, NAA and STAR to lobby the Government. With exhibitions alone contributing £11 billion to the UK economy and supporting 114,000 jobs, it’s imperative that we safeguard this sector, and ensure we come out of this period of uncertainty in as strong a position possible. 

We all must remember that this is temporary and when presented with the opportunity, we’ll be doing all we can to deliver world class events.  When social distancing is no longer required, there will certainly be an upswing in demand for great live experiences, and we, along with the rest of the travel, hospitality, leisure and live events sectors, will be ready and waiting.

Paul Thandi