IN TODAY’S LDP Business, Liverpool City Council leader Warren Bradley once again talks about the goal of being seen elsewhere as a “business-friendly” city.

His comments come in response to a call by top Merseyside corporate lawyer Guy Wallis for Liverpool to drop its fun-loving  image in favour of a  more hard-nosed  business focus.

The founding partner of DWF said there was a perception that other cities like Manchester and Leeds were taken more seriously as major financial centres.

Cllr Bradley acknowledged this, adding: “We need to show not only that we can compete with the likes of Manchester and  Leeds, but also world  cities. I don’t think we are doing it at the  moment.”

That is an understatement.

There are a number of issues that need to be addressed to change that, and a good start would be a different mindset from some of the political and commerce leaders in Liverpool.

Look at the reaction last week to the Government’s refusal to allow cruise ships to start and finish their journeys at the city’s new cruise liner facility on the waterfront.

The fly in the ointment was the £9m of state aid that went towards the construction of the facility. This had sparked an objection from Southampton, which claimed Liverpool’s publicly-subsidised facility posed a commercial threat to its own terminal, which is privately funded.

The Government agreed and blocked Liverpool’s plans and, I have to say, I think they were perfectly entitled to do so.

It’s about time Liverpool embraced and accepted free market principles.

State subsidies and protectionism distort markets, push up costs and destroy competition. Competing on a level playing field ultimately benefits everybody.

However, instead of an acceptance of this, there was the usual bout of victim-speak.

The council’s enterprise and tourism leader, Gary Millar, said the decision was “another snub” to Liverpool, Labour leader Joe Anderson said the minister who made the decision was living in “cloud-cuckoo land”, while Liverpool Vision chief executive Jim Gill said the decision was “bizarre and perverse”.

We heard the same fighting talk over Merseytram, another project that can't proceed without a huge hand-out from the Government.

During the last decade, we have all benefited from globalisation and the freeing-up of markets. Per capita incomes have risen, food is cheaper, clothes are cheaper, holidays are cheaper.

Free trade and free enterprise have created this. And yet we still don't learn.

We cling to the notion that the world, or more specifically the Government, owes us a living.

I recall there being grumbles during the building of Liverpool One that not enough of the construction work was going to local building firms.

As if the £1bn investment from Grosvenor, creating 5,000 permanent jobs, wasn’t enough. Liverpool building firms can, and do, go and win work in other areas of the UK. That’s how free markets work.

Next year, Liverpool sends a delegation to Shanghai for the World Expo, where we will attempt to sell ourselves as a world city.

This is doomed unless we stop expecting hand- outs. It’s time to let go of the old victim mentality, stop fighting and start competing.