Thank you very much, Mr Lindhurst, ladies and gentlemen. It is a pleasure to be here. Thank you for inviting me to talk about “Industrial Strategy: Building a Britain for the future”, in particular.
From all of the discussions that we have had, it seems to me that, around the world, this is a time of exciting opportunity for all parts of the United Kingdom. Around the world, industries are being transformed by new technologies. The ways in which we work, live and consume products and services are changing, and it so happens that the UK—and, in many particular respects, Scotland—is uniquely well placed to benefit from that. Breakthroughs in medicine, the revolution in clean energy that is taking place around the world and the insights that come from advanced manufacturing and the transition in how we get about are areas of great strength, so the approach that we have taken in the industrial strategy is to plan ahead deliberately for the future.
Obviously, that has to be a collaborative effort. If we are to have a strategy, it must be for the long term—a short-term strategy is a contradiction in terms—and the best way to root a strategy in the long term is to make it collaborative and to distil the wisdom of people in the economy, whether they are entrepreneurs, people who run companies, employees, trade unions, scientists or people who run universities and training institutions, and of the leaders of our economy, whether in the nations or in our cities. That is the approach that we have taken.
I have been very grateful for what has been a tremendous response to the consultation right across the UK, but particularly in Scotland. The white paper that we have published—I think that members have seen it and have a copy of it—is very much a distillation of the collective wisdom that came in the responses to the consultation. We will go into it in more detail, I am sure. It sets out four grand challenges where we think we need to give a particular push and impetus to reap all the benefits of the future technological revolutions.
Also, as any good strategy must, it identifies areas of historic underperformance. It is well known that, across the economy, our levels of productivity compared with those of some of our competitors are not what they could be. The more productive we are, the more prosperous we can be and the better off our citizens can be, so the strategy addresses some of the principal drivers of productivity.
We have had, I think, good co-operation from the Scottish Government. It is obviously important that many of the responsibilities are devolved, and, where we can join forces, that helps. The four Is approach—attention to investment, to innovation, to what the Government terms inclusive growth and to internationalism—has contributed to the consideration of the strategy. Those are strong themes of the industrial strategy, and I hope that, as we implement it, this can be an area of shared prosperity.