Bradford City of Culture 2025 – It’s our time.
 Bradford will be City of Culture 2025. The announcement that the District had been chosen from a shortlist that also included Durham, Southampton and Wrexham, was made live on BBC1's the One show and marks the culmination of nearly three years' hard work on Bradford's bid. That process has engaged thousands of people, organisations and businesses and has generated a groundswell of local pride and creativity that will form the platform for delivery of City of Culture.
The bidding process alone has delivered almost £1.5m worth of positive media coverage and secured a return of £5.2m on an initial investment of £1.4m. More is set to come - 2025 will see Bradford District host over 1,000 new performances and events including major arts festivals and national and international collaborations. City of Culture status could see the District bring in an extra £700m, create 3,000 jobs and attract over a million visitors as well as building new skills and capturing the social and well-being benefits of culture and cultural participation.
Youth, diversity and our rich cultural heritage formed the core of the Bradford bid and will continue to be at the heart of our year of culture. The search will now begin to recruit Creative and Managing Directors to lead the delivery of the Bradford bid. Bradford Council's Executive will consider how the District can maximise the opportunity, continue the commitment to culture and creative industries and build a better place to invest, promote and live when it meets on 7 June.
An index to help entrepreneurs work out where to set up shop has been to analyse the top UK cities for budding business owners. Named in the top 20 cities, the data shows that Bradford has an impressive 603 active businesses per 10,000 people. The findings follow previous studies that have seen Bradford named as Barclays Best Place to Start a Business and among the Sunday Times top 20 places for doing business.
Bradford – the Number One Levelling Up Priority
A recently published Prospectus sets out why Bradford must be a national priority for levelling up. The document demonstrates how investing in the District's economy so that its performance at least matches national averages could be worth:
- An additional £2.6bn to the local economy
- An extra £3k a year to local workers' incomes
- Up to £1.6bn in the value of improved skills.
The Prospectus makes the case for Bradford to pilot Levelling Up Investment Areas which would allow relaxation of planning policy in order to accelerate development and clean growth. Transformational opportunities exist in the City centre Southern Gateway which could generate £30bn economic growth over ten years and create 27,000 new jobs and in the south of the district, offering opportunities for housing and sustainable transport and energy.
Elsewhere, projects developed through the Keighley and Shipley Towns Funds reflect the District's ambitions. A levelling up index published earlier this year identified Bradford as having the strongest case among England's largest cities and towns for economic support as part of levelling up given its capacity and potential for economic growth.
The prospectus was launched at UK:REIFF where delegates from Bradford showcased the District's opportunities and ambitions to key influencers, funders and decision makers in the investment and real estate markets with over 4,000 attendees including representatives of 200 local authorities, 500 developers and 500 investors.
One City Park Underway
 Work is underway on One City Park a new state of the art building providing 56,403 sq. of Grade A offices at the heart of Bradford City Centre. Set to open in 2023 the development will create a modern, collaborative work space while meeting the highest environmental standards all within a stone's throw of key cultural assets such as the Alhambra theatre, National Science and Media Museum and Bradford Live a new venue in the former Odeon Cinema. One City Park forms part of a pipeline of projects designed to support the ongoing transformation of the city centre including Bradford Live, a new food market and plans for city centre living.
Over 128,000 of the District's voters turned out in May's local elections representing a turnout of 34%. Labour retained control of the Council and holds 52 of the 90 seats; the Conservatives form the main opposition with 21 seats.
You can find the detailed results here
Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe remains the Leader of the Council.
About our Councillors
- The average age of Bradford District Councillors in May 2022 was 52.2 compared to 54 three years ago. This is lower than the national average of 59.4.
- The proportion of Councillors aged 18-34 is significantly lower than among the District's voting age population.
- The proportion of Councillors aged 55-64 is more than double that in the District's 18+ population.
- Bradford Councillors do however have a much younger profile than national averages with 28.9% under 45 compared to 14.8% nationally and the proportion of Councillors aged 65 and over at less than half the national average.
- Men continue to make up the majority of councillors (56.7%) but the numbers of women councillors are increasing with 39 women comprising 43.3% of the Council up from 38.9% four years ago.
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Experienced senior leader Eileen Milner has been appointed as Chair of the new Bradford Children's Council. Eileen is the former Chief Executive of the Education and Skills Funding Agency priori to which she was and Executive Director at the Care Quality Commission, the regulator of health and adult social care in England. The Children's Company is being formed to accelerate the pace of improvements to services for children and families. |
Jubilee Celebrations
As the nation celebrates the Queen's Platinum Jubilee activities and events will be taking place right across the District and you can find out what's happening, where and when on the Council website.
Meanwhile if you fancy doing something different this jubilee weekend the next Bradford Faith Trail takes place on Saturday 4th June. You can find out more details and how to book your place here. The trail is one of a number of events taking place at the Cathedral during June including a Jubilee concert and street party. Find out more at Bradford Cathedral - What's On.
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