Labour MPs have warned that the Government’s flagship plan to revive British industry risks falling short of its ambitions, with growing concern that a long-promised blueprint will offer neither the radical action nor the detailed investment strategy needed to reverse decades of decline.
Members of the Reindustrialisation Research Group (ReRG), established in July to scrutinise the Prime Minister’s industrial policies, are expected to raise concerns with Cabinet Office minister Sally Jameson, according to The Guardian.
Their criticism centres on Andy Burnham’s proposed 10-year plan, which was presented as a central pillar of the Government’s economic agenda. The Prime Minister said in September that it would set out plans for “stronger public control over these essentials, making them work for people and places again”.
But MPs fear the strategy will lack concrete proposals to rebuild heavy industry, leaving the Government without a credible route to delivering its reindustrialisation promises.
Andy MacNae, head of the group, said there were significant gaps in the Government’s approach that the 10-year plan should address.
“There are a lot of gaps in the government’s reindustrialisation strategy which are not yet filled,” he told The Guardian. “The 10-year plan is a chance to fill them, but in the briefings we have been given that is not what we are seeing.”
He praised ministers for engaging with the group but warned that the absence of more substantive proposals risked allowing Britain’s industrial decline to continue.
“The risk is we don’t see reindustrialisation at all, and continue to see deindustrialisation,” he said.
Jonathan Hinder, another member of the group, warned that the policy could not be built around rhetoric alone.
“Reindustrialisation cannot just be about political slogans,” he said, adding that “pretty drastic action” was needed but had yet to emerge.
The concerns come as expectations for the plan appear to be scaled back. The long-promised 10-point strategy is now expected to be unveiled through a speech before Christmas, accompanied by a document slimmer than originally anticipated, according to the New Statesman.
Rather than setting out a definitive programme of investment, funding and industrial intervention, the announcement could be followed by a consultation lasting as long as nine months.
That timetable risks exposing a gap between Labour’s ambition to rebuild the country’s industrial base and its ability to deliver a practical strategy. For MPs demanding a decisive break with Britain’s record of deindustrialisation, another round of consultations may not be enough.
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