Oral Answers to Questions

Blair McDougall Excerpts

Thursday 29th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jessica Toale (Bournemouth West) (Lab)]

4. What steps he is taking to help increase economic growth in coastal communities.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Blair McDougall)]

The Government are committed to supporting growth in coastal areas such as Bournemouth West. The partnership between Business Growth Dorset and the new business growth service makes it easier for firms to access tailored support. The Department for Business and Trade is also strengthening the conditions for investment and helping high-value sectors such as advanced engineering, aerospace and digital industries to expand. Through national programmes supporting investment, exports and innovation, alongside Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council’s economic strategy, we will ensure that Bournemouth’s businesses benefit fully from UK-wide measures to boost economic growth.

[Jessica Toale]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Bournemouth and Poole rightly have reputations as premier tourism and leisure destinations, but less well known is our leadership in the digital and creative industries. Two businesses in my constituency, Content Ignite and Iplicit, have been ranked in the top 50 fastest- growing tech businesses in Britain by The Sunday Times. Could the Minister please expand on how this Government are supporting fast-growing high-value industries in coastal towns such as mine?

[Blair McDougall]

I am due to come to my hon. Friend’s constituency in little over a month—I do like to be beside the seaside. We often think of constituencies like hers as tourism and hospitality hotspots, but, as she said, they can also be a hive for the creative industries, of which she is such a champion. Through the £380 million creative industries sector plan, we are boosting innovation, skills and access to finance nationwide, which is helping firms, including in her constituency. She will know that businesses in her area also benefit from such a strong talent pipeline coming from her area’s great universities, and I look forward to working with her and learning more when I visit soon.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Minister for his positive, constructive and helpful answers. For Ards and North Down council in my constituency, the thrust of its economic growth strategy is tourism, and there have been many dividends from that. It is important that, right across the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, we have the chance to advance and do better. The Minister might not have had the opportunity to talk to the local Minister in the Northern Ireland Assembly, Gordon Lyons, on this issue, but I hope that he will do so, and thereby we can all gain from his knowledge of what we are doing back home.

[Blair McDougall]

I had a fantastic family holiday in Northern Ireland, driven by my son’s obsession with the Titanic—I had a very moving visit there. I have met my opposite number with responsibility for small businesses in Northern Ireland, and I am happy to have the discussion that the hon. Member suggests.

[Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)]

5. What steps he is taking to encourage businesses to export.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jess Brown-Fuller (Chichester) (LD)]

13. What steps he is taking to support businesses with their operating costs.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Blair McDougall)]

The Government are working hard to reduce operating costs for all UK businesses, including those in Chichester. We are working to reduce the annual administrative burden of regulation by £5.6 billion by 2029, enabling businesses to unlock growth and boost innovation across key sectors. We are introducing the most significant legislation to tackle late payments in over 25 years, providing a support package worth more than £4 billion over the next three years to help business rate payers and fully funding apprenticeship training costs for all eligible 16 to 24-year-olds.

[Jess Brown-Fuller]

The irony for many small businesses in Chichester is that they are busy, well established and popular. It is not bad business, but bad policy, that is making them struggle.

“The current business rates system disincentivises investment, creates uncertainty and places an undue burden on our high streets.”

Those are not my words; they are lifted from the Labour party manifesto. When should my local businesses expect the changes to business rates that they need, and will the Government please explore a commercial landowner levy in their upcoming review?

[Blair McDougall]

The hon. Member is right to highlight the Government’s commitment to tackling inadequacies in the way rates are calculated, and that is exactly what my hon. Friend the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury spoke about from the Dispatch Box the other day. Beyond the rates issue, we are protecting high street businesses from upward-only rental review clauses, and we are introducing a community right to buy so that people can take ownership of valued community assets on the high street. We also have rental options for empty properties on the high street and action on bogus businesses, as the Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade, my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Kate Dearden), mentioned. We are doing a great deal to help the businesses the hon. Member described.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon and Consett) (Lab)]

14. What steps he is taking to implement the modern industrial strategy.

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

15. What steps he is taking to implement the modern industrial strategy.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Blair McDougall)]

We are focused on delivering our industrial strategy so that we are once again a nation that makes things, invents new industries and exports around the world. We are investing £100 billion in industries through the National Wealth Fund, directing £9 billion in research and innovation funding to key growth industries, and bringing forward a huge increase in support for exporters through UK Export Finance.

[Liz Twist]

For 14 years under the last Government, my constituents’ living standards stagnated. Across Blaydon and Consett, we have many successful manufacturing and engineering firms such as Slaters Electricals and Petersen Stainless Rigging in Blaydon, Gardner Aerospace and CAV Systems in Consett, and many more. Can my hon. Friend set out how our modern industrial strategy will support businesses in my constituency to raise living standards for my constituents?

[Blair McDougall]

My hon. Friend is such a powerful advocate for the industrial strengths of her part of the world, and it is on exactly those strengths that our industrial strategy is working to drive up business investment to create the high-quality jobs that will improve living standards and deliver better public services for everyone. The Government’s northern growth strategy aims to increase the potential of the northern growth corridor to catalyse growth in sectors such as those she describes, and I know we will continue to work with her to make sure her constituents get the most out of that.

[Luke Akehurst]

County Durham has been home to proud British industries for centuries, but for decades they have been in decline, and communities such as mine in North Durham have paid the price. Our modern industrial strategy will work to fix that. It is going to invest billions in defence, advanced manufacturing and clean power, which are sectors where the north-east has a unique advantage. Can the Minister assure me that our modern industrial strategy will bring jobs, growth and reindustrialisation to my constituency of North Durham?

[Blair McDougall]

Yes, I can assure my hon. Friend of that. The industrial strategy recognises the great strengths of the north-east, for which he is such a strong champion. As part of the North East combined authority, County Durham is benefiting from targeted measures, including at least £30 million from the local innovation partnerships fund and the pilot to develop a resilient electric vehicle supply chain. This will support locally critical components and capabilities backed by DRIVE35. We will shortly set out further detail on our northern growth strategy, building on the commitment to invest up to £45 billion in Northern Powerhouse Rail.

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

There is only one rebar mill in the UK—in Cardiff—and it can make enough to meet only a small portion of our needs, which means that we are reliant on imports. Even if we open a new facility, we will not have enough capacity for things like the rail projects and the 1.5 million new homes. The ending of the roll-over tariffs is leading to unused quotas. Companies such as Hy-Ten in my constituency cannot risk making an order when, by the time it arrives in this country, the quota has been used up and it cannot be imported. Will the Minister meet me to look at the impact of these changes on the ground before they strangle economic growth?

[Blair McDougall]

The hon. Lady is right to raise industry worries about the turbulent international trade environment. That is why it is so important that the Government are out in the world engaging—because businesses, including the one that she mentioned, need stability. I would be very happy to arrange that meeting with her.

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)]

While I always enjoy the soliloquies of the Minister of State, it might be an opportunity for the Minister who has responsibility for Royal Mail and postal services to answer this question, given that I wrote to his office about the catastrophic failure of the letter delivery service throughout Shropshire. Would he agree to meet with me and my hon. Friend the Member for South Shropshire (Stuart Anderson) to discuss resolving that issue?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Blair McDougall)]

I am very happy to do so. The right hon. Member will understand that Royal Mail is a private company regulated by Ofcom, but it is also a critical part of our national economic and social infrastructure. It is not acceptable if people are not getting their post, which is a message that I will deliver to Royal Mail in person next week.

[Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister mentioned the music venue levy earlier. He knows that my constituency has amazing music venues, so when will the first payment from that levy be made to those smaller venues?