Labour’s new Minister of Industry, Sarah Jones MP joined South West Business Insider editor Chris Ward at the annual Great South West conference in Exeter, to explain the government’s plans for investment into the region, its devolution roadmap and it reassurances for local areas concerned about plans to cut vital central funding such as the Shared Prosperity Fund in October’s autumn statement.
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00:00Well, I've been amazed at some of the richness of the industry that I've talked to just in
00:15this short space of time that I've been here today.
00:19Going to Exeter Science Park and then coming to the conference, I've met defence, advanced
00:25manufacturing, food, technology, maritime, all sorts of different industries that are
00:34clearly hungry to grow and I think that's the message that I'll take away.
00:39There is huge hunger to grow some really advanced, really interesting industry here in the southwest
00:47and we need to, at government level, make sure we're breaking down the barriers and
00:52providing the levers to enable that growth to take place.
00:55One of the messages in the speech that I made was the more you can speak as a single voice,
01:03not with a mayor, doesn't need to be that structure, we don't have to have the same
01:06structures everywhere across the country, but so that if there is an investor coming
01:11to the UK saying we want to invest in a new technology that we're interested in, what
01:17can I do in the southwest?
01:18There has to be a really clear message and a clear path for that business to get to the
01:24investment and we, at government level, have to understand what the needs are for the southwest
01:30and the clearer, the more joined up, the more MPs can work together, local authorities can
01:35work together, business partnerships can work together, the better I think we can get that
01:40relationship working.
01:42But I think it's important to say that I'm really clear there are lots of investment
01:47opportunities here, there are lots of potentials for us to grow, but I can also see what the
01:53barriers are and there will be reforms at a national level that will help, whether that's
01:59reforming the apprenticeship levy, setting up Skills England, whether it's our big push
02:03for clean energy by 2030 and floating offshore wind, there are a whole raft of government
02:09policies for this new government that will help this region and we need to make sure
02:13we can do that as quickly as possible.
02:15Well, there's a lot. How does our strategic defence review fit with our industrial strategy?
02:21How do we make sure we're giving that long-term security to those big, important defence contracts
02:25that we have here? How can we use the changes, setting up Great British Energy, our push
02:32to clean power by 2030 to really get motoring on, floating offshore wind, the possibilities
02:39of the Celtic Sea that we have? Talking to some of the smaller industries here, the kind
02:46of new start-up technologies, they're doing brilliant work in terms of the R&D level.
02:51There's that gap in funding, making it hard for them to scale up. We know that's a problem
02:56across lots of different sectors. We're looking at how we fill that gap with vehicles like
03:01the National Wealth Fund. So I think there's a lot that we can do if we get this right
03:06and work together. It's complicated. You've got such a rich diversity of all kinds of
03:11different industry. We need to make sure we're tapping into all of that. That will be difficult,
03:18but I think the potential for growth and for skills and for growing the economy is definitely
03:26there.
03:27Well, ideally, I think good government has a good strategy at the national level, setting
03:32the direction of travel, setting the kind of framework under which we want to grow
03:37the economy. And then you make sure you're pushing power as far down as you can to a
03:42local area because we don't have the answers in Whitehall. This has been said for decades
03:47and it's true. So how we devolve is really important. We are working on that strategy
03:53at the moment, working on the legislation for the nations and regions work, the devolution
03:57that's going on. We need to get that right. And that involves talking to people. It involves
04:02understanding what's working now and what's not working now and how we make that better.
04:07A lot of our investments, a lot of our reform to the energy systems, our house building,
04:13you've got to take local communities with you or you're not going to be able to do these
04:18things. So we have to make sure we're speaking to local people about what is needed in their
04:24area, that we take those people with us, that they get the benefits, that they don't just
04:29see big companies coming in and they're not getting any of the benefits themselves. There's
04:32a whole raft of advantages to pushing power down as low as you can to make sure we're
04:38actually doing what works because each region is different, each area is different, each
04:43town is different, and we need to find a way of unlocking that.
04:48Longer term funding for local authorities I think is really important. Every local authority
04:52you speak to says if this annual budget means you really can't plan, you really can't look
04:57to the long term, well having longer budgets will make a difference. There is some funding
05:01that we're putting in to do things like ensure that there is a bit more planning resource
05:06in local authorities, something that they really need. And of course in MHCLG, Angela
05:10Rayner will be looking really hard at how do we make the most of the money that we've
05:16got. We're well aware of the kind of challenges and the need for investment into local authorities,
05:23they're so important, but we also are aware of the economic situation and the reality
05:29that we face and we're going to have to balance that.