The North East Edge

This episode brings together two leaders from established North East family businesses. We chat to Nadia Johnson, a fifth-generation member of Ringtons, the tea company famous for its doorstep delivery, but maybe less well known as a manufacturing brand serving the Ringtons brand and many private label providers. A Director at Ringtons since 2023, Nadia now leads on technology, people and culture, commercial customer relationships and retail. We’re also joined by Dr Tom Shanks, a third-generation member and Director of one of the North East’s best-known taxi companies, Blueline Group. Tom’s doctoral research explored innovation and disruption in the UK private hire and taxi market, building on Blueline's history of innovation, including being one of the first taxi companies to deploy radio dispatch systems. This episode explores what it means to join a family business several generations down the line. We pose questions like how do family firms preserve their legacy while adapting to new times? How do they handle technology, succession, brand, customer expectations and new competition? And what can the wider North East economy learn from businesses that think not in financial quarters, but in generations? Together, Nadia and Tom discuss how their family businesses have adapted across generations, markets, technology, customers and shocks, in order to survive and grow.

In this episode we welcome Dame Irene Hays, a significant businesswoman in the region, former civil servant, and now Chair and owner of Hays Travel, the UK’s largest independent travel agency. Dame Irene built a major career in public service, becoming Chief Executive of both South Tyneside Council and Sunderland City Council, before moving into senior Whitehall roles. She has chaired Hays Travel since 2009 and, after leaving central government in 2012, joined John (husband and founder of Hays) more directly in running and growing the North East business into an international operation. During this episode we discuss entrepreneurship, public service, resilience and loyalty. It asks why Hays Travel kept faith with face-to-face advice when the internet was supposed to kill the high street travel agent; how the company copes with constant shocks in global travel; and why nurturing talent and embracing technology is vital to innovation and success. We also ask Dame Irene about herplans and hopes for the next chapter of the family-rooted North East business.

This episode welcomes Jacqui Leggetter and Tom Lawson. Jacqui is Deputy Director and Head of Data Platforms and Operations in Data and Analytics at DWP Digital, part of the UK’s largest public service department, serving around 20 million customers. Her team of over a thousand digital experts in Newcastle help provide data for analytics, insight, audit, reporting and decision-making across a department operating at national scale. Tom is the CEO of Opencast, one of the North East’s major technology consultancies and a trusted supplier to government. Tom became CEO in 2020, and the business has seen strong growth, including recognition in the 2024 Sunday Times 100, the prestigious annual ranking of Britain’s fastest-growing private companies. Building on previous episodes that explored the North East through the eyes of enterprise, politics and regeneration policy, this episode focuses on the modern economy: data, digital public services, technology jobs and AI. Together, Jacqui and Tom help us explore a crucial question: can the North East become a serious national centre for public service technology, data and AI – not as a branch office economy, but as a place that builds capability, talent and trust? They discuss how digital technology is transforming public services for the benefit of citizens, first-of-a-kind scaled AI projects from the region, the Civil Service’s crucial role in employment in the region, links with universities, the importance and challenges in getting the next generation into digital roles, cyber security, ethical use of AI, the region’s claim to be a hub for public services tech, and much more.

This episode welcomes Henry Kippin, Chief Executive of the North East Mayoral Strategic Authority, the recently renamed institution charged with turning devolution from an idea into economic momentum, and one of the UK’s most respected economists, Andy Haldane, former Chief Economist at the Bank of England, now working across universities, civic institutions and national policy debates. Together, they bring different perspectives to the same question: why has the North East so often had the ingredients for success, but struggled to achieve sustained economic lift‑off? The conversation explores today’s challenges and the opportunities presented by devolution – and how the region can make the most of it. They emphasise the need to tell a more ambitious, forward‑looking story and, crucially, to deliver on it. They discuss how decades of under investment means there is huge potential for catch-up, and how devolution means the region has the strategic oversight to think big and joined up. They discuss thinking bigger, working more collaboratively, and recognising the North East’s role as a trailblazer region. Topics include the apprenticeship levy, private investment for capital investment, the fundamental importance of universities to economic growth, the need for fundamental reform of the skills system and apprenticeship levy, spin-outs, start-ups and scale-ups, innovation in public services and fiscal regimes, culture-based regeneration and theexistential value of culture, ports and airports and much more!

Sir John Hall is a defining North East entrepreneur with a career spanning property, sport, and politics. Born in Ashington, son of a miner, for many people, Sir John was “Mr Newcastle” because he believed that the North East could think bigger, act bolder and compete with anywhere. He is best known as the founder of the Metrocentre, helping to transform Newcastle United during the Keegan years and the developer behind Wynyard Park. He was a major donor to the Conservative Party, before recently publicly backing Reform UK. This episode covers his childhood, early career, and significant career milestones. Sir John also gives insight into how the North East has changed, lessons he’s learnt along the way,and what he thinks the next generation should do differently.

The North East Edge is a 5-episode podcast series that shines a light on the regional innovators and visionaries shaping the North East region. Hosted by Charlie Hoult and Dr Fiona Whitehurst from Newcastle University's Business School, they'll be joined by guests sharing their insights and celebrating the successes of the North East business landscape.