Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Gemmell Excerpts

Thursday 11th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Ranger (Wrexham) (Lab)]

6. What steps his Department is taking to help create economic growth.

[Alan Gemmell (Central Ayrshire) (Lab)]

11. What steps his Department is taking to help create economic growth.

[The Minister of State, Department for Business and Trade (Chris Bryant)]

We are championing investment across every nation and region. At the recent regional investment summit and Wales investment summit, we showcased the strengths of our world-leading sectors and secured billions in private investment and commitments. We are making the UK the best place to start, scale and invest, while cutting unnecessary regulation so that businesses can innovate, create jobs and help rebuild our economy.

[Chris Bryant]

My hon. Friend refers to his long and proud career in the industry. It can’t have been that long, because he is so young—[Interruption.] I am being nice.

One thing I have felt very strongly about for a long time is that the hospitality industry in the UK needs to consider a job in the industry as a proper, honourable career. All too often they are seen as jobs that are only done by a few people for a couple of months before they go on to university or whatever. We need to completely change that. That is why as a Minister in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport I tried to ensure that we have proper centres of excellence for hospitality in the UK so that it is a career that is available for people for the whole of their lifetime.

My hon. Friend will know of the work that is being done in Wales via Pub is the Hub to help rural pubs diversify. I think that is really important, and we are committed to ensuring that it continues.

[Alan Gemmell]

My constituency is home to NATS—the good kind, helpfully, because NATS is the UK’s leading provider of air traffic control services. It employs 5,000 people around the country and 500 in Central Ayrshire, and exports its world-class expertise around the world. Will the Minister meet me to discuss that great British success story and how we can continue to champion it?

[Chris Bryant]

I agree with my hon. Friend that gnats— I would not want to cast aspersions on any other kind, obviously—can be a terrible problem in Scotland.

The aviation industry in the UK is an important sector and is part of one of the key sectors that we have identified in the industrial strategy. We want to ensure that all our advanced manufacturing prospers. It was good to see significant extra investment in GE Aerospace in Nantgarw, made only the other day, and I am happy to meet my hon. Friend to see how we can drive forward our ambitions in the sector.