Theresa May to unveil a £556million blueprint to kickstart a tech boom in the North in bid to try rebalance Britain’s North/South divide
PM to lay out her ten point plan for how UK can boom after Brexit
THERESA May will take her entire cabinet to Warrington, Cheshire, to unveil a £556 million blueprint to kickstart a tech boom in the North.
As part of her long awaited Industrial Strategy plan, the PM will announce she is cutting red tape and using the cash injection to try rebalance the Britain’s North/South divide and make the UK “a hive of new industries.”
And the PM will lay out her ten point plan for how Britain can boom after Brexit — starting with a listening exercise to ask businesses what bureaucracy is getting in the way of their success.
Mrs May will promise that the Government will “step up” and take an active role in backing business.
Central to the PM’s plans will be new “sector deals” and “major” investment in research and development to support the “industries of the future” and create more high-skilled, high-paid jobs.
She will unveil plans for new international transport hub in Goole and a massive modernisation of Blackpool — as well as 5,200 jobs at a new “Advanced Manufacturing Park” in Sunderland.
Mrs May said the Government is “not just stepping back but stepping up to a new, active role that backs business and ensures more people in all corners of the country share in the benefits of its success.”
Mrs May will tell her first regional Cabinet meeting that to succeed after leaving the EU, the UK needs a strategy to create a group of new industries to challenge the companies of today.
Ahead of the meeting, the she said: “The modern industrial strategy will back Britain for the long term: creating the conditions where successful businesses can emerge and grow, and backing them to invest in the long-term future of our country.
“It will be underpinned by a new approach to government.”
The sector deals will be driven by firms and their employees to address challenges specific to their industry, and the Government is prepared to offer support including changing regulations to remove barriers to innovation.
Business Secretary Greg Clark said last night: “We are inviting businesses and workers to contribute to this vision to help us create a high-skilled economy where every place can meet its potential.”
Bosses welcomed the Government’s Green Paper outlining the plans.
CBI director-general Carolyn Fairbairn said the final plan must focus on boosting flagging productivity and addressing regional imbalances.
Meanwhile the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB), which was involved in discussions leading to the Green Paper, said: “We are proud to be influencing a major Government economic blueprint and particularly pleased with the push on skills, infrastructure and connectivity as important drivers of productivity and industry.”
Labour dismissed the “belated attempt to develop a proper industrial strategy”, calling it “too little too late.
Shadow Business Secretary Clive Lewis said: “It will be a great shame if the Government wastes this opportunity to put our economy on a new path.”
He added: “But they have already watered down a series of flagship commitments, from putting workers on boards to tackling executive pay, and there are too many people on the Tory benches who think that the only role of Government is to deregulate markets.”
Ministers should use the new Industrial Strategy to “radically reshape” the energy market to save the steel industry, according to a new group of MPs.
Accusing the Government of a “toxic combination of incompetence and indifference” the new All Party Parliamentary Group on Steel want to see British steel used in all publicly funded projects and review of Business Rates to save the industry.
Stephen Kinnock, Labour MP who chairs the group, hit out: “The UK steel industry has been hamstrung by Government policies that place our steel industry at a significant disadvantage, by comparison to global competitors.”
A report by a group of MPs lays out a series of measures to help steel companies combat the dumping of cheap Chinese products, as well as the uncertainty of trade after Brexit.
Mr Kinnock continued: “If we continue along the current path, characterised by a Government whose attitude can best be described as a toxic combination of incompetence and indifference, we will see the further decline of the industry and our communities.”
The report calls for a review of business rates, measures to reduce the number of steel products exported for final processing, and help to improve workers’ skills.
Mr Kinnock added: “By building an investment-friendly environment the Government will allow the UK steel industry to do more than survive, but to thrive.
“That is why the Government must remove the existing disincentives to investment posed by a punitive business rates regime and crippling energy prices.”