Chancellor John Healey's Growth Speech 2026

7 Sep 2026 12:09 PM

Chancellor John Healey delivered his Growth Speech on 7 September 2026.

Thank you for your welcome. Thank you to those of your staff here who have helped organise this event. As we were walking in here I said to Graham, what are you most proud of about the MTC? He said we turn small ideas into brilliant businesses. And that’s why we’re so proud to back you, that’s why I’m so pleased to be here. 

And I’m particularly pleased my good friends and colleagues, the West Midlands Mayor, Richard Parker, and Johnny Reynolds as Business Secretary here as well. And members of the brilliant Treasury ministerial team I’ve got here, James, Dan, Lucy and Torsten.

But above all, thank you, and especially to you the apprentices, I really look forward to some time with you later, so thank you. .

The MTC is an organisation at the very heart of Advanced Manufacturing – and advanced manufacturing is one of our eight Industrial Strategy growth sectors as a government.

Today this centre is 1000 people strong, it’s had government investment of £35m but a turnover of nearly £130m. Conceived and funded first, in 2009 then opened in 2011.

This was established to unlock the potential of the UK industry, with practical, leading edge manufacturing with innovation. 

What better place therefore, for me to speak with you about this government’s determination, our determination for growth, our belief for Britains future.

The UK is home to nearly half of the most innovative companies in Europe. 

We’re world-leaders in life sciences, in defence technology, in creative industries, financial services.

Our science and research base is world-beating; our capital markets are some of the largest and most vibrant anywhere in the world, and the UK stock market is hitting all-time highs.

In the past week, this new job has taken me from my home constituency in South Yorkshire to the G20 meeting in North Carolina.

There I was proud to have behind me the work begun by Keir Starmer to re-establish Britain as a respected voice among our allies…

…and the work begun by Rachel Reeves to recover Britain’s fiscal discipline.

I will build on both as Chancellor.

At the G20, the discussion – to be frank – was focused first on the problems that we all face in the global community: conflicts and trade tensions driving up inflation, that drive up interest rates. 

And these shocks may be worldwide, but they are felt keenly here in the UK - from the cost of the weekly shop to the cost of government debt.

Our borrowing costs are at historic highs.

The reasons are plain: since 2009 high borrowing, low growth has allowed national debt to rise from 64% of GDP, the amount we produce as a country, to almost 100% today…

[political redaction]

…and unfunded spending then after COVID meant that inflation hit 11%, increasing the cost of living and the cost of business.

Of course, UK debt costs were historically around the G7 average until [political redaction]

Since 2022, we have been paying that trust penalty as we battle to re-establish belief in Britain and the UK’s fiscal sustainability.

You know, in our British democratic system, if you have the privilege to serve in government, you don’t get to choose, you don’t get to choose the time, you don’t get to choose the circumstances.

That is for the British people. 

But when I spoke to my colleagues at the G20, I started to tell them a fresh story about Britain. An optimistic story.

One of resilience. Of pride. Of huge latent potential

A country turning a corner. A country whose people, and businesses and communities are ready to seize the opportunity of new technologies and new ideas.

I talked about the trade deals with our allies, the inward investment making Britain the place to do business.

I talked about interest rates – cut six times since the election.

Borrowing - at its lowest level in six years.

Growth – still fragile, but the fastest in the G7 in the first half of this year.

And productivity – finally ticking up after decades of lagging behind our peers.

On my first day in the Treasury, I said that fiscal discipline was my first priority as Chancellor. 

It underwrites every promise this government makes. 

The Prime Minister and I are in lockstep in our commitment to meeting the fiscal rules at the upcoming Budget:

To balancing the books, with a buffer to protect against uncertainty,

To controlling borrowing to bear down on inflation, 

And reducing long term pressures on our public finances.

This isn’t about lines on a graph, or numbers on a spreadsheet.

It’s a matter of values. 

There’s nothing progressive about the government spending £1 in every £10 on debt interest.

If debt interest were a government department, it would be the second biggest in Whitehall, after Health – bigger than Defence, the Home Office and Justice put together.

That’s why staying true to our values means being honest about the need to control government spending.

Fiscal credibility is indivisible from growth. 

It was the heart of those G20 discussions just the other day in North Carolina. Because growth is the sustainable pathway out of indebtedness into prosperity. 

And while Britains growth trajectory has been weak this now must change. This is essential, it is possible, it is central to my purpose as Chancellor. 

You ask any economist what growth is ,you’ll get a number. But ask the public and you’ll get a different answer:

A young person getting a new job in a company that’s on the up. 

A sole trader securing a new contract, able to take the family away on holiday in the summer.

A business winning a new export order, that gives the community around it a new lease of life.

I dedicate myself to this mission as Chancellor, to make Great Britain, Growth Britain again – with more investment, more innovation and more jobs.

Let me be clear. I recognise that the cost of business – that’s energy bills, regulation burdens, planning constraints, labour costs – have grown since Covid. And I want to draw the line.

And whether it is the cost of business or the cost of living, the only way we deal with these in the long term is growth.

I want to see this country as a country of wealth creation. I want our government decisions and policies to raise the levels of confidence, and investment, and profit in British business.

Today, I am going set out how we will do that.

Acting at pace, in partnership with business , and with patriotism – proud to back British businesses, buy British goods, promote British exports, get British people working in the jobs we create in the process,

This is a dual mission. A dual mission for growth led by the Prime Minister and me as Chancellor: No10 North and the Treasury acting together. 

Through devolution. Through greater public control. Through a strong, strategic centre of government. 

In his statement to the house of commons last week, the Prime Minister set out a clear diagnosis of what has gone wrong in the past

The fundamentals of our economy hollowed out through a series of past policy decisions.

Political power was centralised, weakening the relationships between the people, the businesses and the institutions who can make things happen beyond Whitehall. 

The economic enablers were privatised and outsourced. Leaving accountability to a thicket of arms lengths bodies and regulators, too often without the predictability or the pace that underpins a thriving market economy.

Our country was deindustrialised, as the cost to make anything, to build anything here soared, and our dependence on unreliable sources grew including in areas critical to our national security and sovereignty.

And you know the results, you know the results from the communities that have lost out. High streets blighted. Loss of trust, a loss of belief that anyone in politics is prepared to sort it out. 

So the solution is a fundamental shift. A shift that starts with putting power and resources with local leaders – to build infrastructure, boost private investment and deliver local industrial strategies supported by derisking public investment that matches local needs.

To unlock the potential in their region to do things in the best way that Whitehall can’t.

I am determined: that the next chapter of Britain’s growth story will be written in more places. 

That’s not sentimentality, it’s supply side economics. 

A transport bottleneck in South Yorkshire is too often invisible from Whitehall, but it has a real impact on economic growth and on business investment decisions.

That is why at the Budget I will set out a roadmap to fiscal devolution – a permanent transfer of power and resources from Whitehall to our regions, 

With greater business rates retention for local councils and strategic authorities…

…grants from central government replaced by a share of local income tax for every Mayoral Strategic Authority beginning in 2028.

London – of course – is our powerhouse. But if our city-regions could emulate the success of those in France or Germany, growth in our country would be transformed.

In Britain, we also have our growth corridors – the Oxford-Cambridge Growth and the Northern Growth Corridor…

…where I can today announce a new allocation from the British Business Bank,  £150m for scale-ups in the North – so that we get behind the most innovative and fast-growing firms…

…and I am also announcing the Northern 500: bringing the North’s most ambitious mid-sized businesses into a single growth community led by the Great North partnership of Mayors, led by the Mayors, supported by the private sector and by central government. 

Across all nations of the UK, we will support local leaders to deliver local growth.

And as the UK Government we’ve already begun this work with those nations - making Aberdeen the home of GB Energy, making major investment in Welsh railways, and making investments in small businesses across Northern Ireland again through the British Business Bank.

And then following in the footsteps of Richard Parker here in the West Midlands – I’m announcing today that South Yorkshire, Liverpool City Region, North-East England and Cardiff Capital Region will all become the latest Strategic Partners of the National Wealth Fund, 

That means the National Wealth Fund will get hands-on it’ll help these areas build their own investment pipelines.

And because I know that Strategic Authorities are only as strong as the Local Authorities that compose them…

…councillors in every nation will remain at the frontline of local growth, from housebuilding to high streets.

Alongside this, we need a strong, strategic centre of government, wired to enable those local leaders and their ambitions – succeeding where old schemes like Levelling Up have failed.

That’s why the Prime Minister has created No10 North, led now by the First Secretary of State – No10 North working with the Treasury to remove obstacles so that people and businesses on the ground can pull together to drive growth and productivity in their area…

…working together to be more decisive, and more effective in the areas that only national government can sort…

…including by convening the National Economic Council – and this is a joint enterprise between central and regional government, set up to drive growth in every postcode through a greater degree of public control and leadership.

Some might claim that public control is public ownership – but it’s broader than that:

It means local leaders and a stronger centre, together exerting the public influence the public direction over the essentials – transport, energy and housing, other utilities,

It means accountability on the levels on the things that matter to people, that matter to businesses – fair bills, better services, investment that gets delivered,

And it means an active state driving better regulation, quicker decisions. 

It is these things that create the predictability that private enterprise needs to thrive.

This is new:

Greater devolution of power and resources that enables long-term local investment and industrial strategies, 

Public control through an effective and strategic state at all levels, with oversight of the essentials for business success,

A new civic partnership between government, business, academia, 

And alongside this, national policy to drive investment, innovation and jobs and create the right conditions for the private sector to flourish.

So let me take each of these in turn.

Investment, innovation, jobs. 

First investment.

In the UK, we’ve had one of the lowest investment rates of investment in the G7 countries for the last decade and a half.

That is because of the failures of public investment, the failures of public investment to create the conditions for private investment…

…with cuts, delays and uncertainty in capital spending, and a system still gummed up with over-regulation and litigation.

In the last two years we started to make real progress: we’ve boosted public capital investment, set out a 10-year infrastructure strategy, we’ve made it easier for international capital to invest in the UK…

…we’ve unlocked the potential of our world-leading Financial Services sector to channel more domestic capital to domestic British companies. 

And the result.

The result is that business investment has increased by 4.9% since the election alone.

But we need to do more.

So first, I am making changes to the Treasury’s Green Book – reducing the discount rate from 3.5% to 3%.

That will skew investment towards projects with more long-term potential, meaning that more places across the UK will get a fair hearing.

And alongside that I’m introducing economic potential analysis, we put those in the decisions, the business decisions, the business-based decisions that government makes. – so we assess places not on what they are today, but on what they could become in the future.

Second, I will sharpen the focus of our Public Financial Institutions, that are already backed by £200bn, to better align now with government priorities…

…and using public procurement as a strategic tool, to ensure that we back British firms across more of the public sector.

And third, I will take an axe to the thicket of consultation, litigation and administration that has a stranglehold too often on private investment.

So I confirm today my commitment to reducing the burden of business regulation by 25% by the end of this Parliament.

And I can today announce that we will extend our reforms of judicial review from energy to all major infrastructure so that vexatious legislation and vexatious litigation cannot block economic growth. 

Let me also confirm, that I am committed to delivering the findings of the Fingleton Review, and I’ll go further, I’ll extend those to other sectors, including launch of a review of the costs review of rail infrastructure.

And later this autumn, Johnny Reynolds, the Business Secretary and I will convene the major regulators to kickstart work ahead of the Spending Review to identify where those regulators are holding British business back and make practical changes to cut through. 

And let me say this – the people who elected us as a government expect us to get on with it. The role of government is to act. 

So I will end the consultation culture at the Treasury and beyond – supported by new guidance from the Attorney General today that legal risk is not the be-all and end-all of ministerial decisions. 

So let me turn then to those three drivers.

The next growth component is innovation.

The UK is the third in the world for innovation. Our record is extraordinary. I mean, pause and look around in the MTC. 

Our UK formula works: local leaders working with world-class universities, investors, local businesses have created clusters of innovation across the UK – not just in Oxford and Cambridge but in Leicester, Swansea, in Strathclyde, Newcastle , yes, in Manchester and in Rotherham.

As a result, we are world leaders in frontier technologies – in quantum, in nuclear fusion, in AI, in advanced manufacturing. 

But too often, ideas born here in Britain have to go elsewhere to find the capital they need to grow– meaning that the jobs, the benefits and the intellectual property go elsewhere and are felt elsewhere and the benefits are elsewhere than Britain.

And so, I’m setting an ambition to double the number of unicorn firms in this country. 

Together, with Johnny Reynolds I will identify the next wave of unicorns, with the state as an early first customer to ensure they have the necessary backing to scale.

I did this at Defence, I announced this for Sovereign AI last week, we’re doing it with today’s scale-up fund for the North.

Over the coming months I want to go further, working with more departments to earmark dedicated funds to Back British innovation.

And to aid the adoption of new technology, I am today setting the aim of having new sandboxing powers in place, ready to deploy across the economy next year.

Sandboxing powers, what this means is that businesses and innovators, inventors,  can safely test frontier technologies from pavement robots to drones to lifesaving medical treatments. Prevented by the system of regulation now, unleashed to test the innovations of the future.

Let me talk specifically about AI for a moment. We are in the middle of one of the greatest innovations in a generation: Artificial Intelligence. 

AI for economists is a general-purpose technology that will transform our economy at every level: every firm, every community, every hospital, every school, everywhere can benefit.

And unlike every previous world-changing technology – from the factory to the steam engine to electricity to the world wide web– AI self-improves. And on some measures the capability of frontier models is doubling every four months.

I understand and share the concerns people do have about AI: it takes up space it takes up resources, it will change our labour market in ways no one – not even economists - fully understand – replacing some jobs while creating others…

…and we need to face up to the risks, we need to face those risks especially to  our national security and our business security.

We’re already using the power of the state, of public control if you like, to help us grasp the opportunity of AI to do so in a way that guards against these risks…

…through the world leading AI Security Institute, and our AI Economics Institute, and by our AI Minister now at Cabinet.

As Chancellor, I will not let this opportunity of AI pass Britain by, but nor will I, , allow this technology to proceed with no oversight.

So let me turn to that third, our third driver of growth, our nation’s work force.

We’re underusing the huge potential of Britains workers.

The number of young people, that’s16 and 24 not in education, employment, or training, it rose after Covid with the election – nearly one million now, two thirds w have never had a job.

And on top of that, too many of those of all ages, that are in work, are in jobs that don’t pay enough, and without the skills and opportunities to get on to move up. 

Two weeks into this government, the Prime Minister threw down the gauntlet on technical education – with a plan to Mayors to respond to the needs of your local employers, respond to the needs in your areas, and shape pathways that will give children access to technical skills from the age of 14. 

And this autumn, Alan Milburn will set out his full recommendations to government on how to address this scar of youth unemployment. 

I recognise the importance of that work – it’s a moral duty. 

It simply cannot be right that so many of our people in their 20s are stuck on benefits. Not even looking for work. If we fail to tackle that, we write off an entire generation. So, it’s our moral duty.

And it’s also our fiscal duty – because a person coming off benefits and into work saves the taxpayer money, and that becomes a win-win when those people start paying tax themselves. 

And while we tackle youth unemployment, we must continue to attract the very best and brightest from around the world, just as we’re doing through the government’s Global Talent Taskforce. 

So This will be our approach:

Fiscal discipline and the drive for growth in every postcode.

Devolution to hand power to local leaders.

A strong, strategic centre – with No10 North and the Treasury, changed to enable business, charged to enable economic growth. 

And public control and leadership over the services, the utilities that are the foundation for  private sector success.

Partnerships with businesses to drive growth and productivity, partnerships with trade unions to drive productivity, together to drive productivity and growth through more investment, more innovation, and more jobs.

And when it all comes together – as in all the great eras of our country’s history - people start telling each other stories about the future, and not the past.

We’ll see young people, young people  in their twenties and thirties forming businesses that storm to global scale.

We’ll see the self employed make profits and invest it back into their business.

We’ll see high streets and factories on the up.

Growth built in more places, for more places.  Britain’s economy on the up.

We will not deliver all this tomorrow. But we’re delivering the start of it today. 

I recognise the urgency of the moment. 

This plan will guide the government – in the Budget in the Prime Minister’s 10 Year Plan and throughout our work in the rest of this Parliament. 

Good growth in every postcode. Hope in every heart. Not a slogan, but a test. One we have set ourselves, a test that  – with your help - one we will meet.

Thank you.