Boris Johnson: State will lead the way in making UK investment destination
Boris Johnson has today said that the government will lead the way in turning the whole of the UK into an attractive investment direction as part of its “levelling up” plan.
Speaking today in Coventry, the Prime Minister said that it was the state’s responsibility to create the conditions for business confidence to encourage private sector investment.
He also pledged a more flexible approach to devolution in England in a bid to improve leadership arond the country.
And he echoed the Bank of England’s outgoing chief economist Andy Haldane, saying that the UK economy was like a “coiled spring”, ready to rebound after the pandemic.
Johnson’s ambition to “level-up” the country was the core plank of the Conservative election manifesto back in 2019.
“It’s the mission of this government to unite and level up across the whole UK not just because that is morally right, but because if we fail, then we are simply squandering vast reserves of human capital, and we’re failing to allow people to fulfil their potential, and we are holding our country back”, he said.
“I don’t believe there’s any basic difference in the potential of babies born across this country. Everybody knows that talent and energy and enthusiasm and flair is evenly spread across the UK, it is opportunity that is not.
“The single biggest thing we can do… is give people the chance of a good job on decent pay. And that means the private sector has to invest to create those jobs, and we must create the conditions for business confidence.”
He added that making the poorer areas of the country richer was not about taking wealth away from the richer part of the country, such as London and the southeast.
“It’s not a jam-spreading exercise”, he said.
A white paper laying out the detail of the levelling-up plan will follow later this year, he said.
But he did confirm £50m of extra spending for new football pitches, so that every person in the country is “never more than 15 minutes from a pitch”.
He also launched a £4.2bn fund for local authorities to improve their transport links, one of the 2019 manifesto pledges.