Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps her Department is taking to help increase (a) levels of manufacturing and (b) the number of jobs in Rother Valley.

Manufacturing plays an important role in the Rother Valley making up ~15% of jobs compared with ~10% for the UK as a whole, according to the ONS Business Registers and Employment Survey.

The Government recently published its Advanced Manufacturing Plan aiming to make the UK the best place in the world to start and scale up a manufacturing business – backed by £4.5 billion of funding and business environment measures.

The Plan expands our Made Smarter Adoption Programme – currently available in Rother Valley – supporting manufacturing SMEs to grow through digital technologies. Over 390 companies have already received the programme’s support in the Yorkshire and the Humber region.