A future Labour government would deliver a “proper industrial strategy” geared towards seizing the opportunities offered by clean technologies, in order to boost UK competitiveness, unlock high quality green jobs, and bolster Britain’s energy security, Opposition Leader Keir Starmer will say in a major speech tomorrow.

Speaking at trade union GMB’s annual congress in Harrogate on Tuesday, Starmer is to promise that workers would be at the heart of the clean energy transition planned by Labour, while making the case for embracing the green technologies that can position the UK as a ‘clean energy superpower’.

Starmer is expected to accuse the government of failing to provide a sufficiently ambitious industrial strategy by contrasting the broadly ‘laissez-faire’ approach favoured by Conservative Ministers with Labour’s economic vision, which is set to follow a similar playbook to that adopted by President Biden in the US.

“There is no way to growth in Britain in holding back the future,” Starmer is expected to say. “But equally, there is no way to growth that doesn’t involve bending and shaping it. We can create a new business model for Britain, one which creates economic security and grows not just our productivity, but our hope and our optimism.”

The Labour leader is to argue that at the global level “the tide has turned”, and “the economic argument which has held back working people is now on the back foot” as governments around the world adopt more interventionist economic policies.

As such, the speech is set to echo many green businesses’ fears that without urgent policy action to accelerate the net zero transition the UK risks lagging behind the US, EU, China and others in the race to secure green investment, jobs, growth, and energy security.

“Our allies around the democratic world are waking up to the threat of energy insecurity and the opportunity of economic security,” Starmer is expected to say. “For too long, Britain has allowed the opportunities of the new energy technologies to pass us by. Without a plan, the energy industries we rely on will wither and decline. 

“The Tories think it’s the market doing its job when British industry falls behind. It’s not some glitch in their model – it is the model.”

The speech comes ahead of the launch of Labour’s so-called Green Prosperity Plan, which is set to be unveiled next week in Scotland and is expected to provide more details on the Party’s plans to decarbonise the UK power system by 2030 while creating around 500,000 new green jobs.

It also comes as Labour faced growing calls to confirm its proposals to bring a halt to new oil and gas projects in the North Sea.

The plan to halt new oil and gas drilling has attracted fierce criticism from the Conservative government and its media allies over the past week, while some trade unions, including the GMB, have voiced concerns about the potential impact of the plan on employment and energy security. But over the weekend hundreds of organisations ranging from green NGOs and the Women’s Institute wrote to Starmer urging him to stand by the proposal to end new oil and gas licenses, arguing such a move is critical to delivering on the UK’s net zero goals and maximising green growth opportunities.

Starmer is expected to use his appearance this week in front of an audience of trade union leaders to stress the potential to create good, secure, well-paid jobs through the net zero transition.

“The world around us is changing, and changing fast,” he is expected to say. “President Biden once said ‘when I hear climate change, I think jobs’. When Labour sets out its mission for Britain to become a clean energy superpower next week, we are thinking jobs too.

“Jobs – good, union jobs – will be fundamental to cleaner, safer work, new and better infrastructure for Britain.”

Labour has previously promised to invest £28bn per year to accelerate the net zero transition, establish a state-owned green energy firm dubbed GB Energy, and ramp up wind, solar and nuclear capacity if it wins the next General Election, which is widely expected later next year.

Further details on these policies are expected to be unveiled by Starmer next week as part of Labour’s much-touted Green Prosperity Plan, with reports indicating the plan could also include a promise to only borrow to invest in green projects.

However, Starmer will also stress during his speech tomorrow that workers rights, trade unions, and British jobs would be at the heart of the green energy transition under a Labour government.

“I won’t pretend that just because a technology is greener that automatically makes working conditions fairer,” he is expected to say. “So, as new nuclear, battery factories and offshore wind repower Britain, Labour will build strong supply chains that create jobs, new skills and decent wages here in Britain.

“We will work with you and with industry to seize the opportunities of hydrogen, carbon capture and storage. Our Green Prosperity Plan, like President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, is our plan for growth and because we are Labour it is also a plan for working people, their jobs and their prosperity.”

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