Sarah Jones MP: speeches

Speeches

• 1 May 2025 · Energy Prices: Energy-intensive Industries · Hansard source

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  There was no coherence under the previous Government, and there will be coherence under this Government. We are developing our plan of support for our foundational industries in the industrial strategy. I know that the Opposition are very keen to see what the industrial strategy will contain. They will have to wait a few weeks for its publication, but all will be revealed in due course.

• 1 May 2025 · Energy Prices: Energy-intensive Industries · Hansard source

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  I think the hon. Gentleman knows that his own party are the experts on deindustrialisation, which we saw significantly across all parts of our manufacturing sector, including at INEOS. I regularly meet INEOS, as do the Secretary of State and other colleagues, and we are looking at what we can do to support the sector. It faces a lot of challenges, and we are looking to try to resolve them.

• 1 May 2025 · Energy Prices: Energy-intensive Industries · Hansard source

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  We are happy to look at a range of options. The whole point of the clean energy plan is that we are using a very diverse range of interventions, some of which are more high-tech and for the future, and some of which are well established. We need that mix.

• 1 May 2025 · Industrial Strategy: Chemicals Sector · Hansard source

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  When we look at the eight sectors that we are trying to turbocharge through the industrial strategy, we see that the chemicals sector underpins so many other sectors. We need to make sure that we protect it. As I have just said, chemicals manufacturing has fallen by nearly a third over the past three years; we need to turn that around. We are looking at what we can do to break down barriers and make improvements—for example, on the cost of energy. That is part of the mix when it comes to making sure that we are secure in the future.

• 1 May 2025 · Industrial Strategy: Chemicals Sector · Hansard source

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  The industrial strategy has identified eight key growth-driving sectors that will be the arrowhead of our economic success, but of course they cannot succeed without the critical supply chains and foundational industries that underpin them. We are looking at all those foundational industries, including the chemicals industry, to see what the barriers to growth are, what challenges they face, and how can we overcome them through our strategy.

• 1 May 2025 · Industrial Strategy: Chemicals Sector · Hansard source

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  I do not want to underestimate the challenges that the chemical sector faces. Between 2021 and 2024, UK chemicals manufacturing fell in real terms by about a third. We are working to improve the UK’s trade and investment relationship with the EU. We want to build exports and investment opportunities and reduce barriers to trade. Conversations are at an early stage, so I will not go into specifics, but we are certainly working to help the chemicals industry.

• 1 May 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend and several other Welsh colleagues have been talking to me about this. We renegotiated the deal with Port Talbot and the £500 million that goes alongside that. I had a good meeting this week with Blastr, which is looking to build an iron pellet plant at the Port Talbot site if possible, and we are trying to support that. Of course, our focus in recent weeks has been on Scunthorpe and British Steel, but the steel fund remains. The steel plan is still being worked on, which is very broad and hopes to lift the entire UK steel industry.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The Office for Clean Energy Jobs is focused on developing a skilled workforce in core energy and net zero sectors that are critical to meeting our mission to make the UK a clean energy superpower. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I are working with Skills England to assess skill needs and engaging with the Department for Education on apprenticeships and the wider growth and skills offer.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Clean Energy Transition · Hansard source

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  We firmly believe that the clean energy transition is the economic opportunity of the 21st century. In recent weeks, we have secured thousands of new jobs in carbon capture, offshore wind and British supply chains. As we transform the way we power our country, we are determined to ensure that communities across our country benefit from good jobs and good wages. That is what our clean energy mission is all about.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Clean Energy Transition · Hansard source

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  I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s support for Government policy and for our investment in CCUS. As he knows, Acorn is a matter for the spending review. I talk to many industries in Scotland, and everyone is supportive of the scheme. We support the scheme and are working closely with industry, but it is a matter for the spending review.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Clean Energy Transition · Hansard source

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  I was delighted that last week the Government were able to announce an initial £300 million through Great British Energy to invest in supply chains for domestic offshore wind. The fund will boost domestic jobs, mobilise additional private investment and secure manufacturing facilities for critical clean energy supply chains. We are publishing our industrial strategy in the spring, which will set out our approach to the highest growth-driving sectors, including clean energy industries.

• 29 Apr 2025 · National Wealth Fund: Opportunities for Industry · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question, though it was not quite about the National Wealth Fund. He is right to highlight electricity prices. This is a challenge for industry and one we inherited from the previous Government. The best way to bring those bills down is to secure clean power by 2030, but he is right to highlight the challenges, and that is what we are trying to fix.

• 29 Apr 2025 · National Wealth Fund: Opportunities for Industry · Hansard source

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  The National Wealth Fund has a critical role to play alongside Great British Energy in driving investment and jobs into clean energy industries. The fund is already making great progress, including participating in the latest round by GeoPura, a UK-based green hydrogen pioneer, as well as supporting critical minerals in Cornwall, as part of our mission for clean power by 2030.

• 29 Apr 2025 · National Wealth Fund: Opportunities for Industry · Hansard source

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  The Government welcome the plans to invest in and around Luton, including the expansion of Luton airport and the incredibly exciting Universal theme park, which is on the “perfect site”, as its president said. It also has perfect MPs. These projects, along with the mass clean power investments we are delivering, will grow the economy and deliver direct benefits to the communities that host this vital clean power infrastructure which will take all of us off the fossil fuel market rollercoaster.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Reducing Industrial Electricity Prices · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to point out the huge amount of private sector investment that is coming in with clean energy. This is why, in the industrial strategy, clean energy is one of the growth-driving sectors where we have seen 10% growth in the economy. We are also seeing hundreds of thousands of jobs, which the Conservatives now seem determined to oppose. We will introduce the clean energy of the future, and that is why we are pushing for clean energy by 2030. That will bring down bills, give us energy security and create really good quality jobs.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Reducing Industrial Electricity Prices · Hansard source

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  Industrial energy prices doubled under the previous Government and industry suffered, as did consumers, when wholesale prices rocketed at the start of the Ukraine war. The best way to secure bills for the long term—for industry, as well as for consumers—is to deliver clean power by 2030. The truth is that the Tories ran down our energy infrastructure, just as they ran down our road and rail infrastructure and our public services. We are rebuilding that infrastructure, making it more secure for the long term and less reliant on foreign dictators, thus giving us energy independence, good jobs and cheaper bills.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Reducing Industrial Electricity Prices · Hansard source

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  As UK Steel said recently, the main driver of the price disparity is the wholesale electricity cost, which is driven by the UK’s reliance on natural gas. The best way to secure bills for the long term is to deliver clean power by 2030, and that is what we are doing.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We were talking earlier today about the importance of floating offshore wind in the Celtic sea, and the huge possibilities that brings the UK for energy security and good jobs.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  I agree with my hon. Friend’s comments about the tireless work of our hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe on securing the future of British Steel. The Secretary of State went to the British Steel site in Scunthorpe just after the legislation was passed. I think it is fair to say that there was great relief after our intervention, but workers will also quite rightly be asking us, “What happens next and how will you secure the future of the site?” We are now completely focused on that.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman is right. We need an audit of our critical national industries, and we are doing that through our industrial strategy, so that, particularly in the eight growth-driving sectors that we have identified, we have policies to ensure that companies in the UK can continue to thrive. We believe in free and open trade, and we are not moving away from that; the Chancellor is making that case this week with our American colleagues. Security is incredibly important. The right hon. Gentleman will know that we are ensuring that where security is an issue, we take appropriate action, but that does not mean that we will stop trading with the second largest economy in the world.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  As the Secretary of State made clear during the debate of Saturday before last, the capacity for primary steelmaking production is important, and the steel strategy will look at exactly how we deliver that. There are new ways of delivering primary steel—using hydrogen, for example—that other European countries are now using and developing. We will ensure that, whatever the future brings, we have the right level of production in this country.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  I think the hon. Gentleman is referring to the situation at Whitehaven. As I have already said, British Streel told us directly that it could not use that coal because of the sulphur content and working coke ovens are needed to—

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes important points and that is exactly what we are looking at in the steel strategy. On dumping steel, having been requested to examine the issue by British Steel, the Trade Remedies Authority has agreed to look at steel safeguards and ensure that they are fit for purpose in the here and now. We are also looking at what happens beyond 2026, when the steel safeguards stop, to ensure that sufficient safeguards are in place. All the issues she mentions need to be looked at, including electricity prices and energy prices, which doubled under the last Conservative Government. As we have said before, 53% of global steel production comes from China. We need to look at that imbalance, at how we can ensure cheap steel does not come into this country and at how carbon leakage is working. We are working hard on all those issues.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman makes a really good point: we are spending public money, and we need to be incredibly careful in the way we do that. Of course, what we spend will be accounted for in the Department for Business and Trade annual accounts, as the insolvency costs were when we were in this position in 2019. We will update the House and bring forward whatever we can on those figures. He is right to raise that. I want to reassure him that the £2.5 billion is not floating around; it is a commitment in the Labour manifesto, and it is budgeted for. How we might spend that money is what we are trying to devise through the plan for steel, which will rightly have a lot of scrutiny from this House, the Public Accounts Committee and others.

• 22 Apr 2025 · British Steel · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to raise the issue of Tata investing in those assets and the future of the Port Talbot site, which is incredibly important. Of course, we meet regularly to talk about that. We have the transition board, which the Secretary of State for Wales convenes, along with the Welsh Government. We are working at pace to understand what those future investments could be. She is right to demand that the steel plan is for everywhere rather than just for one part or other of the UK. We want to and will ensure that the nations and regions all benefit from the funding and mechanisms that we put in place to improve procurement, scrap and all those things. Of course, it is not just Tata in Wales; Celsa too is incredibly important and a very impressive company. She can be reassured on that front. I am always happy to have more conversations with colleagues from Wales about how that can work going forward.