Sir Keir Starmer will set out his industrial strategy on Monday as he seeks to kickstart the stuttering economy and reduce the UK’s reliance on foreign workers.
The decade-long plan for “national renewal” will include £275 million in skills investment to train Britons to do jobs in growth industries which might otherwise require imported labour.
The strategy will include specific funding to train people for work in defence, engineering, digital and construction roles.
Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the strategy “will help transform our skills system to end the overreliance on foreign labour and ensure British workers can secure good, well-paid jobs in the industries of tomorrow and drive growth and investment right across the country”.
Monday’s industrial strategy will be followed later in the week by a new trade plan intended to make the UK the best-connected country in the world to do business.
The Prime Minister will launch the industrial strategy hoping it will help in his mission of delivering economic growth.
The economy shrank by 0.3% in April, the biggest monthly contraction in gross domestic product for a year-and-a-half, as businesses felt the impact of global uncertainty caused by Donald Trump’s tariffs and domestic pressure as a result of hikes to firms’ national insurance contributions.
Around one-in-seven young people are not in education or employment, and the number of people taking an apprenticeship has fallen by almost a fifth between 2016/17 and 2023/24.
The Government hopes the growth sectors identified in the industrial strategy will create 1.1 million new jobs by 2035.
The skills package includes capital investment from a £200 million fund which will support new facilities including “technical excellence colleges” providing specialised training for local industries.
The total funding is expected to train thousands more workers by 2029 including computer programmers, IT technicians, electrical and civil engineers.
Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said: “Skills rightly run right through the heart of this industrial strategy because they are key to breaking the link between background and success for young people and delivering prosperity for our country.”
Stephen Phipson, the boss of manufacturers’ organisation Make UK, welcomed the skills announcement.
“We look forward to working with the Government to fix the skills gap in manufacturing, which has been the sector’s Achilles’ heel for decades,” he said.
Other elements of the plan are expected to include measures to help cut energy costs for industries which have complained they are being forced to compete with rivals overseas who face lower bills.
Meanwhile some £380 million will be spent on a range of projects intended to double private investment in the creative industries.
Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith welcomed the investment in skills but said “the Government are stepping on the accelerator and the brake at the same time” by hiking national insurance for firms and introducing extra employment rights which could increase costs.
“This inherent contradiction cannot make for a feasible or serious strategy, and will hold the Government to account for it,” he said.
