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Birmingham Post
Birmingham Post
Business
Tamlyn Jones

NEC Group not planning blanket closure of venues

The NEC Group says it will leave it to individual organisers to decide whether to proceed with planned events at its venues as the coronavirus situation escalates.

The Solihull-based group has stopped short of bringing in a blanket programme of postponements and cancellations at its venues which host a range of events such as conferences, trade shows and concerts.

NEC Group owns and operates the National Exhibition Centre (NEC) and Resorts World Arena in Solihull and the International Convention Centre (ICC) and Arena Birmingham in Birmingham city centre.

Its comments come as events such as the National Homebuilding & Renovating Show and gaming festival Insomnia66 both announced they would now take place later this year at the NEC instead of in March and April respectively.

And last week Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce said its annual business awards, due to be held at the ICC this week, would now take place in the autumn.

A statement from the NEC Group, which is owned by private equity house Blackstone, said: "Our principal concern is for the welfare of our customers, visitors and staff.

"We are closely monitoring the advice of the World Health Organisation, Public Health England and local government in relation to coronavirus and its impact on events.

"We have established a series of precautionary measures in accordance with such advice and will adapt these measures and our policies if this advice changes.

"In the meantime, we are continuing to support customers to enable them to run their events.

"Where we have been approached about the potential rescheduling of certain events, we are working with those customers to deal with such requests on a case-by-case basis.

"Details of those that have rescheduled or cancelled their events can be found on our venue websites."  

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