Industrial Strategy

Greg Clark Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Greg Clark)]

As part of the industrial strategy, the Government committed to making the most of the UK’s strengths so we can be at the forefront of emerging technologies and industries in the years ahead. The creative industries, from film to fashion, and from arts to video games, are an undoubted strength of our economy; indeed, they are at the heart of the nation’s competitive advantage. It was to build on this strength that the creative industries were identified as a priority for an early sector deal.

Sector deals, where industries are invited to come forward with plans for their future, embody the ethos of our collaborative approach. They show how industry and the Government, working in partnership, can boost the productivity and earning power of specific sectors. We have already struck ambitious sector deals with the life sciences, and the automotive sectors, and we will be publishing deals with the construction and artificial intelligence sectors shortly.

Last year Sir Peter Bazalgette undertook an independent review of the sector. The Creative Industries Council with critical input from the Creative Industries Federation and other leading voices across the sector have championed their industry through the process. Today’s deal represents a key milestone in this journey but it is just the beginning; the first iteration of an agreement that will develop over time.

The deal contains mutual commitments to invest more than £150 million across the lifecycle of creative businesses, including by boosting the places of the future by funding leading creative clusters across the UK to compete globally; enhancing innovation in technologies and content of the future via research into augmented reality and virtual reality; and ensuring that firms can access the creative skills of the future via a careers programme that will open up creative jobs to people of every background. There are further commitments to establish a new industry-led trade and investment board to ensure the sector can better take advantage of international opportunities; a new commercial investment programme to provide business and investment support to creative businesses; and new measures to strengthen copyright protection for intellectual property generating creative businesses.

The creative industries account for £92 billion of GVA, 2 million jobs and are growing twice as fast as the economy as a whole. This deal will help generate an environment in which the creative industries continue to thrive.

Today I will place a copy of the document in the Library of the House.

[HCWS593]