Levelling up: Six key takeaways from the Basque experience of regional competitiveness and inclusive growth

What might we draw from the Basque experience that’s relevant to the UK ‘levelling up’ agenda? This was the subject of a recent Aston Centre for Europe and Foreign Policy Centre event that I chaired, with the participation of four speakers: Dr Edurne Magro, Senior Researcher at Orkestra-Basque Institute of Competitiveness; Bill Murray OBE, adviser on the Spanish economy at Global Counsel; Dr Igor Calzada, Senior Researcher at the Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research and Data (WISERD), Cardiff University; and Henriette Lyttle-Breukelaar, Director of Economic Strategy at Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership. This article summarises six key takeaways from the discussion.