Manufacturing Skills

Brian Leishman Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2026 Westminster Hall

[Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair today, Sir Christopher. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight West (Richard Quigley) for securing this debate.

We hardly make anything any more. For decades, Scotland has been the victim of industrial vandalism, with our manufacturing base hammered. Last year Petroineos—in other words, the billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the Chinese Government—ended a century of oil refining at Grangemouth. Ultimately, private capital and a foreign Government decided that 435 jobs were to be lost on site, along with 2,822 in the wider supply chain, removing a positive destination for local young people. Over £400 million per annum was lost from Scotland’s national economy, and Scotland’s fuel security was weakened.

In my time in this place, I have been critical of both the Scottish and UK Governments. I stand by that criticism, but the truth is that the SNP Scottish Government knew about the closure for three years and did absolutely nothing to stop it. I will not allow anyone in the SNP to rewrite history on that—although I do not need to, because as everyone can see, SNP Members could not be bothered to attend the debate this morning. They are taking their passion for abstentionism and lack of participation in this place to a new level.

This year, there is yet more industrial devastation as Alexander Dennis’s Canadian owners, NFI, stop bus manufacturing in Scotland, with 115 job losses. That is another piece of Scotland’s manufacturing base deemed disposable by international capital. And yet again the SNP Scottish Government have abandoned workers. Some 334 zero-emission buses were to be built through the ScotZEB3 scheme. Alexander Dennis was awarded 123; the Chinese company Yutong was awarded 166. The truth is that in Scottish politics it was the working class that propelled the SNP into generational power, and the SNP has rewarded communities with buses from Beijing. There are redundancies at Ferguson Marine. We are seeing the creation and promotion of the Tory idea of freeports, which means international tax havens for private capital to extract resources and wealth from Scotland. Make no mistake: the SNP is comfortable with all of that.

With manufacturing, we are on the cusp of a green industrial revolution. We have an opportunity with renewables. But what have the SNP Scottish Government done to create new manufacturing jobs in that sector? They have had off-the-record meetings with corporations looking to get involved in Scotland’s renewable industry. The end result is a green investment portfolio worth £3 billion of green assets that were to be bought by private firms. That is money that the Scottish Government could have ploughed into manufacturing skills and job creation, transforming communities. Instead of building a Scottish manufacturing base that would create worker and community prosperity, the SNP went for outsourcing, privatisation and the continuation of pandering to foreign capital. The SNP are capitalists to their very core.

I do not hold the desire for independence against the SNP or anyone that identifies as a Scottish nationalist—not in the slightest. Indeed, I respect their view. The reason I have no time for the Scottish National party is that it has decimated Scottish manufacturing and waged war on the Scottish working class.

--- Later in debate ---

[Saqib Bhatti]

I reject the framing of the question. [Laughter.] No one finds youth unemployment funny. Many business owners talk to me about what happens when a young apprentice is interviewed. They say that if they have a 25-year-old with experience versus an 18-year-old with no experience, that hinders the prospects of hiring them. That is the reality. I am sure the hon. Gentleman is a conscientious MP, so I encourage him to pose that question to his small business owners in the way I framed it.

[Brian Leishman]

Will the shadow Minister give way?

[Saqib Bhatti]

No, I am going to carry on. When met with reality, the Government’s plans in this space fall far too short. The Government have made lots of noise about recruiting targets. I just noticed that the Government announced 40,000 new construction placements every single year. Will the Minister confirm whether that is the same or a different version of the announcement made in a Government press release in August 2025, which mentioned

“40,000 future builders, bricklayers, electricians, carpenters and plumbers”?

Government by press release is one thing but recycling old press releases is something else. Those apprentices deserve better.

There has also been no mention of the impact of the Government’s fiscal policies. Just as we were having this debate, I saw a headline saying job vacancies are at their lowest in 12 years. There are 176,000 fewer jobs now than when Labour took office.

Members have mentioned the Education Secretary’s ambition to close off academic options and offer more vocational options for the 14-to-16 age group. I am deeply sceptical of that policy, and the Opposition are calling for an evidence-based approach. When a previous Labour Government introduced similar reforms, fewer children from poorer backgrounds ended up going into academic subjects. They were funnelled into vocational work. We believe that plenty of people who would have been able to get into higher-quality jobs were funnelled off at a lower age, so we are deeply sceptical. The policy announcement is welcome, but we are yet to see significant detail. Many of the headteachers I spoke to last week asked how their teachers will be trained to deliver vocational subjects and where the funding will come from.

We are incredibly proud of the reforms instituted by the previous Conservative Government, which have meant that England’s education delivery is among the best and most resilient in the world, according to the programme for international student assessment rankings. When I meet people from the advanced manufacturing sector, they laud the fact that a knowledge-rich curriculum has helped young people to gain critical and analytical skills, including in numeracy. We are really worried that some of the Education Secretary’s announcements will undermine opportunities for young people.

The criticism comes not just from the Opposition. Jon White, the chief financial officer at building materials firm Huws Gray, has said that employers are struggling with a lack of incentives to hire younger people. He pointed to the Government’s narrowing of the gap in respect of the national minimum wage, which I have alluded to, and said that they should change the rules in respect of how employers can spend the apprenticeship levy. I hope the Minister can shed a bit of light on some of the questions around the apprenticeship levy.

Making it easier for employers to hire young people is really important, which is why we have pledged to halve employer national insurance for young people aged 21 to 24, to help them get to into work. We have also offered more incentives to small businesses to take on young people. Small businesses are often lauded as the lifeblood of the UK economy and the high street, and they, not big businesses, are the greatest employers of young people across the country. We believe our approach will free up the business sector and manufacturing to employ more young people; I would welcome the Minister’s response.