Offshore Wind

Alice Macdonald Excerpts

Wednesday 14th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Ed Miliband]

I would really like to do that. The Prime Minister and I, with the Chancellor and indeed the First Minister of Wales, had a fantastic visit to north Wales when we announced our small modular reactors there, and the excitement among the students at the college about the future we are building was so palpable to see. I must say that that is the difference between the Government and the Opposition. We are embracing that future and building that future for those young people; they, frankly, are selling those young people down the river.

[Alice Macdonald (Norwich North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the investment for the Norfolk Vanguard project, which will play an enormous role after being awarded over a third of total capacity under these contracts. The Secretary of State has spoken about the benefits for jobs. Can he speak specifically about how we will ensure young people now at school and in college will benefit with apprenticeships and training in these industries?

[Ed Miliband]

My hon. Friend makes a really important point. We will be setting up five technical excellence colleges in clean energy, and they will be incredibly important in training young people for this clean energy future. There is a huge number of opportunities out there. Part of this is about the training, but another part is about young people getting to know about these opportunities. I was at an amazing jobs fair in the north-east—organised by Kim McGuinness, the mayor of the north-east—which brought together some of the developers with young people, and the excitement among those young people about this future was so palpable. We need to do more of that.