Good morning ladies and gentlemen.
It was in the throes of war in 1940 that Winston Churchill first spoke of a ‘special relationship’ between Britain and the United States. It’s a relationship which has grown ever since – and I was interested to hear your former Mayor Rudy Giuliani say that after 9/11 the people of New York were able to draw great inspiration from the people of London’s response to the blitz all those years ago .
Today, the security threats which the United Kingdom and the United States face are radically different from those we faced in 1940. And there has never been a greater need to share our experience and our expertise across the Atlantic. If 9/11 took us by surprise in unveiling the full horror of modern terrorism, every incident since has reminded us that we face a common threat which can strike indiscriminately and anywhere. In 2005, by a twist of fate, Mayor Guilani was in London in the vicinity of the bomb blasts on 7/7, and spoke of the “eerie” experience of what must have felt like 9/11 all over again.
The UK and the US have never needed their special relationship more than now and our governments are working together closely on international terrorism issues – we shall no doubt hear more about that today.
But what of the business community? As the world’s leading specialist insurance market, Lloyd’s insures 93 per cent of the Dow Jones and 92 per cent of FTSE100 companies . Anticipating and responding to business risk is at the heart of what we do at Lloyd’s. Around six months ago we therefore launched a new series of our 360 risk project on the subject of terrorism.
Through the 360 risk project we seek to explore some of the world’s major emerging risks and ask how business can best mitigate and manage them.
As part of our work on terrorism, we conducted research with global business leaders and we held a conference for insurance and business leaders in London. Through this, we were left in no doubt that business needs to do more to manage the changing terrorism risk. Here are three of the findings which we discovered:
One. The majority of the world’s CEOs believe that the business community is now as much at risk from political violence as government, yet only one in three feel they really understand the risks their company faces.
Two. Only one in three people agree that we have learnt enough from events like 9/11 in the US and 7/7 in the UK to be better prepared next time.
Three. The overwhelming majority of business executives in the UK say “home-grown” terrorism is a significant emerging risk for business – and at our event in London it was described as the biggest security threat the UK faces.
This morning we want to share some of what we have learnt with you, and to discuss the particular issues which we need to collectively respond to here in the US, Lloyd’s largest market.
In particular, how can we close the gap between a growing awareness of the risks, and an apparent lack of tangible action to mitigate and manage them on the part of many businesses?
We are honoured to have a very distinguished panel of speakers from all over the world to lead our discussion today and to help us share lessons learnt.
Our approach this morning will be a truly international one, and I would like to extend a special welcome to Sir Richard Mottram, Permanent Secretary for Intelligence, Security and Resilience in the UK; Dr Rohan Gunaratna, Head of the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research based in Singapore. And I am delighted that they will be joined by two excellent speakers from the east coast, Sir David Veness who is Under-Secretary-General for Safety and Security at the United Nations and will bring a further global dimension to our discussion; and Dr Richard Falkenrath, the Deputy Commissioner for Counter-Terrorism at the New York City Police Department who will bring a vital New York angle.
However, at this point I would like to hand over to Tom Carver, who is Senior Vice President of Control Risks and runs their Washington office, and who has kindly agreed to chair the proceedings this morning. Thank you Tom, and thank you all for making time in your busy schedules to prepare for our event and to be with us.
