North London Business Networking Breakfast - Presentation from Richard Cornelius

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This morning, I made my way at 7am to Cafe Buzz in North Finchley to attend a business breakfast, with around 40 other local business people. The guest of honour was the Leader of Barnet Council, Richard Cornelius. The purpose of the breakfast was to brief local small business owners and traders as to the local Conservative polices towards small business. This was the third in a series of meetings, The Lib Dems went first with Jack Cohen, Barnet Lib Dem group leader. Last month we had Barry Rawlings representing the Labour Party. Today was Richard Cornelius.

The meeting is a monthly, usually first monday of the month event. It is open to all. It is £10 for a light breakfast and the opportunity to network, with £5 discount for members of the Federation of Small Business.

The remit of the meeting was quite simple. Councillor Cornelius would be answering questions regarding his parties policies on small business. It was not a forum for a wider political debate. I regularly attend these networking meetings. They are a great opportunity to catch up and make new business contacts. If you are running a small business, then it is a great opportunity to network.

As ever, I enjoyed my breakfast and had a chat with some interesting local business people. We discussed the use of artificial intelligence in small business, the forthcoming North Finchley Music Festival and GDPR, which is a big issue for all businesses and one which is not well understood by many. I'd urge anyone who runs a small business to read this article from the Federation of Small Business website on the issue.

Whilst the discussions and networking was very useful, sadly the main act didn't show up. Richard Cornelius, despite having confirmed to the organisers that he would be attending, did not show up and did not send apologies or a replacement. Around 40 people had made the effort to attend the meeting and paid their money for breakfast. I emailed Cllr Cornelius for an explanation, which has not been forthcoming.

I will refrain from any comment, other than to say if Cllr Cornelius was unwell, I hope he gets better. The group of people who he was due to address are intelligent, hard working and natural networkers.  They will doubtless draw their own conclusions.