Champion Canterbury Awards

Wednesday 13 April 2005

Just to remind us all of why we are here. The Champion Canterbury Awards are a celebration of the excellence and skill of businesses in the Canterbury region.

Tonight within the tight time frame available, I would like to make the point that we need to keep the spotlight on how good we are as a region.

Canterbury does, and can claim, to lead the way nationally. Whereas Auckland has an internally focussed economy, driven by services and consumption and property, Canterbury has an outward focus into the emergent global economy. We are a trading city.

We have the best of both the old and new economies. We are the first region to show up any signs of what is going on in the world economically.

Hopefully some of you will have noticed this week that our biggest problem is growth. How we manage this growth, where we try and steer it, how far we want to go down the road to bigness is a problem and an opportunity that we should all be working on.

In my opinion what has to go on the way to that destination is our absurd cultural cringe.

Canterbury is a very, very good place to live, work and play. World class, and then some. If we do not take more active pride in what we are doing and what we can still do in the future, nobody else will do it for us.

Business excellence and business pride is a vital investment in our future. Champion Canterbury gives us a chance to see just how much we have to be proud about.