The government will build commercial skills in government and make it easier for civil servants to take temporary placements in the private sector as part of its 10-year industrial strategy.
The Labour administration published the industrial strategy, which aims to create a “new relationship between business and government” and make the UK “the best country to invest in anywhere in the world”, this morning.
In a joint foreword to the strategy, the prime minister, chancellor and business secretary described it as “robust, strategic, and unashamedly long term” and “nothing less than a whole-government effort”.
The strategy sets out plans for eight “high growth sectors”: advanced manufacturing; clean energy industries; creative industries; digital and technologies; financial services; defence; life sciences; and professional and business services.
The document – titled The UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy – also sets out a series of planned civil service reforms to help create an “enduring partnership” with business.
To give confidence to industry that the officials responsible for developing policy and engaging with businesses “understand how they operate, their drivers and needs, and how and why investment decisions get made”, the strategy says the government will build commercial skills in government, including creating an in-house business academy.
The academy will be “underpinned by a new standards framework setting expectations for all business-facing civil servants from entry to expert level”.
The government is also introducing a new approach to business placements, making it easier to bring industry expertise into government and to place civil servants into industry for periods of up to a year, the document says. This will include the creation of a Diplomatic Advisory Hub with the British Chamber of Commerce to place diplomats into SMEs operating across the world.
The strategy also aims to improve coordination across government and with industry, with reforms to achieve this including:
- Consultation between the MoD and other government departments in developing future prioritisation of R&D initiatives and innovation spending, with additional input from the intelligence community
- An increase in industry participation in shaping these plans, including through the external advertisement of leadership roles, and input from the Defence Innovation Advisory Panel and Defence Industrial Joint Council
- Upskilling of the civil service cadre working at the intersection of national security and defence and science and technology, including through the College for National Security and enhanced coverage of relevant security clearances
- Improved information-sharing and governance arrangements between relevant departments, including a new cross-government forum to bring coherence to efforts to encourage development of these technologies in the UK
- Collaboration between institutions and funding bodies across the science, innovation, and technology ecosystem to ensure that the wider benefits of funded research in civil-military areas are recognised, ensuring effective value for money.
The strategy also sets out changes to establish “strong pro-growth institutions and governance”.
This includes creating a “strong, effective, and permanent” independent Industrial Strategy Council, which will have its headquarters in Manchester from 2026, with a second presence in London. This will be supported by an expanded secretariat made up of analysts and policy professionals. The government will introduce an industrial strategy bill to implement measures which require primary legislation, including putting the ISC on a statutory footing.
Another institutional change will see the Industrial Strategy Unit in the Department for Business and Trade become a permanent delivery unit to coordinate implementation and further policy development, working closely with the Enterprise and Growth Unit in the Treasury.
The government will also set up delivery boards that bring together departments and agencies responsible for regulation, public finance, innovation and procurement – and minister-led taskforces that bring together government, business and public agencies to focus on important missions, such as making the UK the best place in the world to scale up.
Economic institutions and arm’s-length bodies will, meanwhile, be reviewed to ensure they are hard-wired to deliver the industrial strategy.
To support delivery of the strategy at a local level, oversight and implementation forums with devolved governments and mayoral strategic authorities will be created.
The government also plans to recruit “industry champions” to inject dynamism, innovation and ambition into sector plan delivery. These “business disruptors” will act as chief advisers on each sector plan, “bringing expertise and spearheading partnership with industry”.
The strategy also confirms the establishment of a Commercial Innovation Hub as part of a suite of procurement reforms.