Manufacturing in the UK

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Iain McKenzie

Tuesday 14th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr McKenzie]

Where once our shipbuilding industry pushed the boundaries of design and introduced propellers, double-skinned hulls, bulbous bows and countless other improvements, we stopped pushing the boundaries and proclaimed as a nation that anyone could build a ship. Instead, we should have been saying that not everyone can build the ships of tomorrow. We stopped asking, “How can we improve this product?” and stopped challenging the accepted conformity to regulation.

In other sectors, the rapid adoption of technologies is essential to innovation, and has transformed existing industries. The success of our economy depends on the extent to which businesses in all industries and sectors invest in adapting technologies and building capacity in order to get ahead. This is particularly true now. Since the industrial revolution, economic downturns have, on the whole, always been followed by surges of innovation. Manufacturing can have a prosperous future, but only if we prioritise research and development.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr McKenzie]

I will make some progress and then give way.

Innovation and the speed at which innovative ideas are put into action are the keys to success. However, the costs of cutting-edge research and the latest high-tech processes are greater than ever before and are often too large for one company to bear. No competitive economy should leave universities, research laboratories and the private sector’s innovation arms to their own devices. The UK’s competitors understand that a country’s research and innovation capability is a key part of the national infrastructure, yet the UK spends relatively less on pure research development compared with its peers, and a significant part of that 23% is in the pharmaceuticals industry.

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[Rehman Chishti]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way and congratulate him on securing this important debate, about which I know he is passionate. On research, does he agree that we need to get more students and pupils to study engineering, which would lead to an increase in manufacturing and construction? If so, does he welcome the Government’s initiative of creating university technical colleges around the country, one of which will be in Medway, to help to achieve that aim?

[Mr McKenzie]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will touch on education later in my speech.

The UK’s innovation performance is generally weak, although I concede that there are some exceptions. However, UK manufacturing companies overall spend less of their turnover on innovation than their European peers, while, oddly, the opposite is true for UK service companies. Other countries, notably the Nordic countries, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Israel, have significantly increased innovation as measured by US patenting. The UK has grown innovation output slowly and from a relatively low base.