Chancellor John Healey to pledge 'new age' of industrialisation with British shipbuilding

Chancellor John Healey is to back a “new age of industrialisation” in British shipbuilding with billions in funding for major projects to strengthen national security.

The South Yorkshire MP, set to speak today at the Labour Party conference, is to give a hint as to the direction of his political intent.

The former defence secretary is expected to argue that the UK cannot return to the coal mines of its past, while setting out a vision for growth based on modern industry.

Describing his politics as “shaped by the industrial heartlands of South Yorkshire”, he uses the old Orgreave mine - now an advanced manufacturing park - as an example.

“Our coal mines are not coming back,” he is expected to say, as he instead sets out funding for homegrown shipbuilding.

“But this is how Britain’s industrial past is being remade now for the modern world.

“This is the new age of industrialisation. A new confidence in Britain.”

Healey, who quit as Sir Keir Starmer’s defence secretary in a row over military funding, looks to confirm investment in three new floating docks at Clyde’s HM Naval base. Then £115m for the funding of a new marine research vessel.

Ahead of his speech, he said: “By backing British shipyards, we are not only boosting national security but also securing resilience in the industries that will drive growth today while building the capabilities the country needs for the future.”

Plans for a new era of change echo the Prime Minister’s own pledge to prioritise “reindustrialisation” as a way of boosting Britain’s sluggish growth.

Andy Burnham, to give his own speech at his Labour Party conference in Liverpool tomorrow, also looks to lay out the “broad direction” of his plans over social care.

He is prepared to take unpopular choices and hike taxes to fund an NHS-style social care system, he has already suggested.

And he blamed the “cowardice” of previous generations of politicians for failing to “grasp the nettle” of reforming England’s system.

He said nothing was off the table to pay for the reforms, which would be put to the public at the next general election.

Mr Burnham’s previous attempts to reform the system as health secretary was condemned as a “death tax” by opponents.

"They are spending tens of thousands of pounds from their savings, sometimes losing their homes.

“So to suggest there isn’t a cost to people at this moment in time, there’s a huge cost.

“Social care in England is as unfair as American healthcare, where the most vulnerable in society can lose everything, they can be wiped out, not just by the condition that they have, but wiped out financially.”