£150m bid to boost manufacturing
The Government has launched a £150 million package of "major new measures" aimed at helping manufacturers take advantage of new technologies, especially in the aerospace industry.
Business secretary Lord Mandelson said the investment would increase access to information and support, boost workers' skills and tackle challenges facing companies.
Access to services available through the manufacturing advisory service will be increased to enable businesses across the UK to benefit from low-carbon and other growing markets.
Lord Mandelson is due to visit a company in Cambridge specialising in touch-screen technology to launch the new initiative and will attack the "lazy assumption" that Britain doesn't make anything anymore.
"The reality is British manufacturing employs more people than the financial services sector. We are the sixth biggest manufacturer on earth and manufacturing is one of biggest exports and for that reason it's critical for Britain's fight back to growth and for the decades after that," the minister will say.
The Business Secretary will add that there was no denying British manufacturing had changed over the last 30 years, but he believes that what has emerged from that transformation is a world-leading 21st century manufacturing base.
The announcement is part of the Government's drive to support the development of new industries and new jobs.
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