It has been a long slog, but we got there in the end. After years of planning, work can now finally begin on the country’s first nuclear power station for a generation.
While for some this is a controversial decision, I welcome the government’s go-ahead. At the TUC’s annual congress last week, our theme was “jobs, rights and investment”. Hinkley Point delivers all three.
It will be the largest construction project in the UK, creating 25,000 high-quality jobs and 500 apprenticeships. It will bring in billions of pounds of foreign investment. At a time when our economy is facing uncertainty, it is good for business confidence and proof that Britain is still open for business. And a deal that’s been signed by trade unions and EDF energy will ensure working conditions at Hinkley are among the best and safest in the construction industry.
Now that Hinkley finally has the green light, our message to ministers is: “Don’t stop there!” HS2 and Heathrow expansion are both shovel-ready, and a new programme of affordable housebuilding is decades overdue. The slow progress on major infrastructure projects is reflected in the UK’s investment gap with other advanced economies.
TUC analysis shows that between 2010 and 2014 the UK was fifth from bottom among 29 OECD countries for public investment, and third from bottom for private investment. So the challenge here is for both government and the private sector. But let’s be clear – the lead has to come from the government.
Businesses want to locate where there is high-quality infrastructure, decent housing for employees, good public services, and a highly skilled and healthy workforce. Far from crowding out the private sector, government investment encourages business to invest and base operations in the UK.
The slow and torturous saga of Heathrow expansion highlights another problem: poor government decision-making. Tens of billions of pounds are ready to be spent by private investors. The expansion will support 180,000 new jobs and provide a buyer for 10% of UK steel production. But the government is still dithering.
With Brexit ahead of us, we can’t go on like this, or working people will be left to pay the price. One of the big Brexit risks is the loss of foreign investment. This would increase both the UK’s investment gap and our trade deficit.
The TUC has been clear that the best way of addressing this risk is to maintain our access to the single market. But the government must also boost public investment, and improve the speed and quality of its decision-making on major projects. There’s no shortage of them in the public and private sector crying out for more investment. Businesses and families need high-speed broadband, high-speed rail and new council homes.
While nuclear is an important part of meeting our future energy needs, renewable energy projects need more investment too. Cuts to support for solar power in the last few years have led to the loss of half the 35,000 jobs in the sector. We need sustained investment across the renewable energy sector if we are to achieve our ambition of a carbon-free future, and seize the chance to deliver more high-quality jobs.
That infrastructure spending should be part of a national industrial strategy to make sure that the UK economy has the capacity for strong growth, and delivers decent jobs. As well as investment in infrastructure and technology, it must include more investment in people, and the skills they need for an advanced economy with high-quality work.
But our industrial strategy can’t just focus on manufacturing. Too many jobs in the UK, many of them in service industries like hotels and retail, are already low-paid, insecure and low-productivity. We need action to improve jobs in these industries too, to make sure that people right across the country have the chance of a decent job with decent pay.
So now that ministers have finally made the right decision on Hinkley Point, they must go further, creating more jobs with the pay and security needed to buy homes, raise families and enjoy a good quality of life.
