Secretary of State for Wales has outlined the UK Government’s ambitious plans for
Wales which aim to deliver thousands of skilled jobs and ensure
Wales’s place as a hub for innovation and the green industries of
the future.
Speaking to an online audience of representatives from Welsh
business, industry and tourism on Thursday (20 May) the Welsh
Secretary explained how the UK Government will build back better
and greener from the pandemic by investing in digital
infrastructure, providing financial backing for green industry
and supporting jobs and growth right across Wales in the coming
months and years.
Launching the UK Government’s Plan for Wales, Mr Hart also
described how his government will operate at a community level in
Wales, working directly with local authorities and other groups
on delivery of funding and major projects.
Speaking about the plans, Prime Minister said:
Just as the economic heft of the UK provided the resources to
get all four of its constituent parts through the worst of the
pandemic – and acquire the vaccines that will ultimately bring
it to an end – so that strength in numbers will help Wales
become fairer, greener and more prosperous as we build back
better from Coronavirus.
By working together we can bring faster internet connections,
more reliable mobile signals and better transport connections.
We can create good, skilled, well-paid jobs from Menai Bridge
to Machynlleth to Merthyr Tydfil and we can help Wales play its
part in building a net-zero economy with everything from the
Holyhead Hydrogen Hub to vast floating windfarms in the Celtic
Sea.
Welsh Secretary said:
The UK Government is stepping up a gear in Wales. We are
accelerating our support for local communities to help them
recover from the pandemic, we are bringing the UK Government
closer to Wales and we will lead Wales’ recovery into a green
industrial revolution of jobs and growth.
Every single investment we make will be looked at through the
prism of jobs, livelihoods and sustainability. Like never
before people will see the UK Government work directly with the
22 Welsh local authorities as well as other local partners.
Neither Westminster nor Cardiff has a monopoly of knowledge and
expertise and I firmly believe it is local communities that are
often best placed to determine both how to meet the specific
needs of their areas and what will have the greatest impact.
The Plan for Wales has been published following a year which has
seen unprecedented support provided to businesses and individuals
in Wales during the Covid-19 pandemic with more than 500,000
Welsh jobs protected by UK Government support schemes including
the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, billions provided in
government loans to Welsh firms and an extra £8.6bn allocated to
the devolved Welsh Government through the Barnett Formula since
the start of the pandemic.
Mr Hart said that the collective strength of the United Kingdom
has been instrumental in harnessing collective scientific,
industrial and financial strength to deliver a world-class
vaccination programme that has provided a path out of lockdown.
The Welsh Secretary outlined a series of ambitious projects
across Wales to which the UK Government has recently committed
funding and support, and reiterated his government’s backing for
longer-standing policies like significantly improving Wales’
digital infrastructure and ensuring transformational growth deals
cover every area of Wales.
Projects highlighted by the Welsh Secretary include:
- Investing, alongside industry, more than £40m to support a
cluster of industries in South Wales to transition to net-zero.
- Hundreds of millions of pounds in business and job creation
in every area of Wales via the Growth Deals programme.
- Investing £15.9m in low-carbon heavy goods vehicles which
will be pioneered in Cwmbran.
- Moving more jobs in UK Government departments including the
Home Office and the Department for Business Energy and Industrial
Strategy to locations in Wales.
- Making almost £5m available for the Holyhead Hydrogen Hub
project to pilot the use of hydrogen in the transport sector.
- Investing up to £30m, subject to approvals, in the Global
Centre of Rail Excellence to create a world class train testing
and R&D facility in the Dulais Valley.
- Supporting the emergence of floating offshore wind, with the
Crown Estate holding a formal leasing round for floating offshore
wind projects in the Celtic Sea.
- Implementing the new Levelling Up Fund which will invest up
to £4.8 billion in local infrastructure across the UK that has a
visible impact on people and their communities.
- Launching Project Gigabit, a £5bn connectivity programme to
support the rollout of gigabit-capable broadband in the hardest
to reach communities in Wales and across the UK.
- Continuing to improve rural connectivity via the Shared Rural
Network, a £1 billion deal with the mobile network operators to
deliver 80% 4G mobile coverage from all four operators across
Wales and 95% coverage from at least one.
- Investing in Wales’ transport infrastructure including a
further £2.7m to upgrade the digital signalling capability on the
Cambrian Line.
- The delivery of the first-ever Freeport in Wales which could
lead to thousands of new jobs.
Secretary of State for Wales said:
The UK Government’s ability to act quickly and protect our
economic future has been instrumental in saving jobs and
livelihoods as vast swathes of our economy were shut down.
This includes the furlough scheme, which has protected more
than 460,000 jobs in Wales and the Business Interruption and
Bounce Back loan schemes which have also provided support worth
over £2bn for Welsh businesses.
The UK Government has supported people and businesses across
Wales through the worst of this pandemic and we will now do
everything in our power to lead the way out of it.
ENDS
