Recession won't kill the radio star!

Here's a summary of the conversation between Ali McLean and Victoria Derbyshire on Radio 5 Live - you can listen to the discussion by visiting http://www.bbc.co.uk/fivelive/programmes/morning.shtml

'We're far from being in a recession, and I'm sick of all the negativity thank you very much. Our business arranges activity holidays in Europe and all over the world- they're not cheap, but our last two weeks have been our best ever.

'We have a fairly middle class client base, and they're the ones who have been hit the worst by higher interest rates and higher fuel prices. Yet just yesterday, I sold a family of six a ten day white water rafting adventure holiday in Slovenia for £6000. People are still prepared to spend money.

'I'm a member of the Entrepreneurs' Forum, and we're a body of business owners from tiny companies all the way up to our chairman, Paul Walker, who's the Chief Executive of Sage. We held our annual conference recently, and it came out that 88% of our members believe the media has exacerbated the current financial and economic position in this country. We're talking our way into a recession.'

Victoria Derbyshire, Dj for Radio Five Live, said that the British Chamber of Commerce performed a large survey with 5000 businesses, both small and large, and their members reported back that sales on their order books have declined dramatically in the last three months.

Ali responded, 'We resigned from our local Chamber of Commerce a few months ago. We felt that the Entrepreneurs Forum offered us a lot better value, and a lot more positivity. We all talk to each other, and most people say that they are optimistic about the future of the economy here in the North East. If we can survive, everyone else can too.'