Leading Liverpool Council out of the difficulties it finds itself in is both a professional and personal challenge for its new interim chief executive.
Last month, Theresa Grant was appointed to head up the local authority until May following the resignation of former incumbent Tony Reeves earlier this year. She said her first task after taking up the hot seat at the Cunard building was to bring stability to an organisation that has been rocked by a number of high profile, public failings.
The former Northamptonshire Council chief executive has garnered something of a reputation for being a local authority firefighter, having steered it through reorganisation and its response to the coronavirus pandemic. She said Liverpool itself may need “drastic transformation” to right itself going forward.
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Her appointment however, isn’t strictly business, as the Irish native revealed her long-standing connections to the city. She said: “I came to the UK 26 years ago, I came to Manchester originally and spent 14 years at Manchester City Council and there was always the competition with Liverpool, always for the first city and all of that, and I realised when I came over to Liverpool a few times to visit a few times, that it was quite a spectacular city and I was looking at it at the time from a infrastructure and a building perspective as I didn’t really know it that well or the people as my base was Manchester.
“Then in the last few years, I’ve got to know so many people from Liverpool and become good friends with them and got to know people who’ve moved out of Liverpool. People who’ve left Liverpool speak about it with such passion that I started to come back again and realised it was a gem I was missing.”
Ms Grant, who was made an OBE in 2021, said her long history with Liverpool had actually made her wish she had the opportunity to be a formal part of the city’s history much sooner. She said: “The fact that it has 75% of its population in Irish roots kind of explained to me why I felt so at home here when I would come to Liverpool. I used to get the ferry from here back to Ireland, so it was a bit like coming back to a strange kind of roots here because it feels very Irish to me and it’s close to Ireland as well.
“It made me want to come here. What I have discovered since I’ve been involved is I wish I had come sooner.”
The interim chief executive, who will help with the appointment of her long-term successor, said she is also involved in a charity that raises funds for Irish communities in Liverpool and Manchester and Leeds. She added: “I’ve been trying to do my little bit for Liverpool from afar.”
Ms Grant is very much in the thick of it now.
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