Nissan’s dividend

A timely boost for green energy

EDUCATION AND skills are also critical if this region is also to become the beneficiary of investment comparable to the new £1bn Nissan plant in the North East to develop electric vehicles and the battery technology.

As Yorkshire, too, looks to maximise its potential as the nation’s new engine room for green energy, there will need to be a closer correlation between the education sector – and the skills requirements of employers.

And this is illustrated by the scale and significance of the Nissan announcement – it expects to create 1,600 jobs and anticipates a further 4,500 posts being created in supply companies. Hopefully the expertise of Yorkshire engineering firms will be amongst the beneficiaries and provide a much needed boost to this area.

Yet, as a bullish Boris

Johnson hotfooted himself to the North-East and some Tory MPs hailed the decision as a vindication of Brexit after uncertainty over Nissan’s future in the region, he now needs to recognise the importance of education’s role when it comes to manufacturing and net zero.

Now is the time to be investing at skills after the decision of the car supplier masked Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s admission that the UK and EU have failed to strike a deal over the British financial sector’s postBrexit role in Europe. The longer-term implications of this – and proposed trade deals with, amongst others, Australia – remain to be seen.

What is certain, however, is that new opportunities will only be maximised if the Government invests now in the next generation as part of the country’s wider post-Covid recovery.