Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Deirdre Costigan.)

At the outset of this Adjournment debate on ceramics, I declare my interest as a member of the GMB trade union and chair of the all-party parliamentary group for ceramics, for which the secretariat is provided by Ceramics UK. I also want to place on the record the support that has recently been given to the sector under the stewardship of my right hon. Friend the Business Secretary. The £120 million that has been provided is a massive boost to a sector that had all but been forgotten and was worried that it was on a managed decline towards the end of a ceramics manufacturing base in the UK. We know that there is work to do with that money. The sector and the unions are coming together as we speak, and they are working with the Business Secretary’s officials to make sure that every penny of the money that he and the Chancellor of the Exchequer have been able to find for us goes towards protecting jobs, safeguarding manufacturing and making sure that the sector has a viable future, as it is so important to the constituency that I represent.

And to mine!

The sector is also important to my hon. Friends’ constituencies in other parts of Staffordshire. I will rehearse some of the figures, Madam Deputy Speaker. Of course, given that I am a proud MP who represents a brickworks, you will be aware that ceramics offer a multitude of benefits to our economy. The sector employs 20,000 people, generates around £2 billion for our economy, and is responsible for £600 million-worth of exports. One can walk around pretty much any part of the country and come across a ceramic product that is made in the UK, be it bricks, tiles, tableware, or steel that is made using refractory-grade ceramics. I say this often, but I will say it again: we cannot make steel in this country without ceramics, so everything that the sector does contributes towards the greater good of UK plc.

What strikes me about the support we give to the ceramics sector as a Government is that, while we are making a big commitment—and the right commitment—to give British people homes by delivering 1.5 million houses, we could simultaneously support our bricks industry, and the building sector more widely. Does my hon. Friend agree that while we are backing British, building British and buying British, it is important that we ensure that that sector support comes through from Government?

I agree with my hon. Friend, who has been pursuing that for a long time. The ceramics industry is a great example of where procurement rules could be geared more towards supporting domestic manufacturing, not least in bricks. If we are going to use Homes England money to subsidise, at cost to the British taxpayer, the building of the homes we need in this country, we should insist that the companies that build them are buying their bricks from British manufacturers. It is a circular economy, it is good for our environment, and bricks have a long-term life of over 150 years—much better than timber and cladding.

Does my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour agree that the best way to do what he and my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) suggest is for the Government to get behind my 10-minute rule Bill to back British bricks?

There are many wonderful 10-minute rule Bills and private Members’ Bills that support the ceramics sector, and my hon. Friend’s back British bricks Bill is one of them. More to the point, it makes economic and environmental sense, rather than importing bricks from around the world. We have the capacity in the UK to manufacture enough bricks to meet the housing targets that the Government have rightly set. We can also then ensure that the bricks reflect the sorts of build that we want in those communities—Staffordshire blue bricks in Staffordshire, and the sorts of bricks that are proudly made in Hampshire for your constituency, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is an important part of who we are, and what places look like, that the materials that houses are built from reflect the materials available. The Minister will know that ceramics is now a huge part of our defence industry. The air filtration systems in nuclear submarines are made from a ceramic component that is serviced in Stoke-on-Trent. The ceramic coating necessary for small modular reactors, which will hopefully be made in Derby, is required because it can resist the heat that is generated at the speed at which they will revolve. The filtration systems for most metal products in this country go through a small ceramic piece—it looks like a fruit pastel—that filters out the impurities while withstanding the intense temperatures of molten metal. Without those small technical ceramics, the bigger manufacturing activities that we undertake in this country simply would not be possible, and that is before we get on to the advanced ceramic materials that are available for heat recovery and green technology advancements, and before we think about the biomedical implications. There are ceramic components that can now be used for hip and elbow replacements, which have much less likelihood of being rejected by the body because they are a natural compound and the bone grafting takes easier. There are countless opportunities for ceramics to play a real-world solution to the challenges we face. They are often hidden in plain sight; we just need to look for them. That is before we get to the beloved tableware and giftware that made my city so famous, and that we see across this place and in the tiles on our floors.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

One last time.

I may seek another intervention, but I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He raises an important point. He will know, as will my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford, that my cousin got married in New York relatively recently. My wife and I went, and we went to an exhibition where we came across a Staffordshire plate made in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell). I shrieked with delight; my wife thought I was being weird. The amazing thing was that I told my Staffordshire colleagues, and we got a history lesson from my hon. Friend. That just shows that in every corner of our globe, British ceramics, and particularly Staffordshire ceramics, are flying the flag for team GB.

I believe my hon. Friend is referring to the Copeland plate that he saw, which was made in the old Copeland factory not far from my current constituency office. Again, that demonstrates the soft power that we have in the export market. Mr Speaker himself commissions ceramic products from Stoke-on-Trent as part of the giftware he hands out when he receives dignitaries from around the world. I am proud that things made in Stoke-on-Trent find themselves gracing palaces around the world. The Minister will know, however, that it has been a tough time for ceramics. Ceramics is predominantly a gas-based industry, and the cost of gas power is almost three times what it was in 2019. In 2019, we were looking at about 40p per therm; today, it is 116p per therm. I genuinely appreciate that the Minister does not control the international wholesale gas price and, as I have on occasions disagreed with the Opposition, drilling will not necessarily bring down that price. However, it is nevertheless a fact that it costs three times as much today to fire a product, whether it be a brick or a plate, as it did in 2019. It has been estimated by the TUC and GMB through their “Save British ceramics” policy document that 78% of the heat capacity needed to meet the ceramics manufacturing base in this country could come from electrification. It is not impossible to electrify. However, the Minister will also know that electricity prices in this country are significantly higher than in our European counterparts. That is all before we get on to the issue of the illegal dumping in this country of products that are made using subsidised Russian gas through non-EU countries. We do have a genuine problem with the competitive nature of the products that we make based on the energy that they consume. That is where we have been talking to the Secretary of State and the Minister for Industry about the supercharger scheme. We were disappointed that ceramics in their entirety were not included in the British industrial competitiveness scheme. We welcome the fact that small technical ceramics have been included—that step has been genuinely welcomed across the sector. The pitch we want to continue to make today is for the rest of the sector to be considered for the supercharger scheme as part of the ongoing consideration that the Department is running. There is a perversity to the supercharger scheme. Industries that are part of it receive all the benefits of being in it, receiving discounts on some of the policy costs and some of the transmission costs; industries that are not in it not only do not receive those benefits, but actually pay towards those that are part of it. Being out of the scheme therefore means paying for the industries that are in it. We have the perverse nature of energy-intensive industries like ceramics subsidising the energy costs of energy-intensive industries such as steel, some of the chemical sector and some of the metal sector. That is not something the Government have done by design; it is just the way the system has developed over time, by trying to make it cost neutral to the Government and passing those costs on to higher energy users. That is unfair—it is. It means that the costs of the electricity that could be used in factories around Stoke-on-Trent and around the UK are higher because organisations that use as much energy as we do are getting a subsidy and a discount. That needs to be changed. The sector does want to move towards electrification. We really welcome the fact that part of the £120 million secured by the Secretary of State was for capital costs to allow factories to move towards heat recovery technology and towards electrification of processes, where possible. However, the challenge is that while the electrification process may be covered in some of the capital costs, the running costs of the electric process, compared with the gas process, means that the savings are marginal and, in some cases, it is more expensive. I know that the Secretary of State is working as quickly as he can, and I know that the Government say they are working at pace on trying to bring down those industrial electricity costs, but at the moment that is an impediment to realising some of the good work that we could do as a result of the investment that the Secretary of State has brought forward. I would just ask the Secretary of State to think about which of the SIC codes he would consider including in the supercharger scheme. Given that we have an ambition in this country to build 1.5 million houses, ensuring that every community has homes that my constituents and the constituents of my colleagues can move into must be part of that. If product code 23320—bricks and tiles in baked clay—could be included, that would benefit manufacturers in your constituency, Madam Deputy Speaker, and in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee). Manufacturers in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Amanda Hack), home to Ibstock, would also benefit from that. Given that we want to try to encourage house building, this seems like an absolute no-brainer. There are also issues around product code 23200, which are refractory products. As I have said, to make steel in this country, refractory-grade ceramics that can withstand the intense heat of that process are needed. At the moment, we are becoming dependent on potentially importing those sorts of ceramics into the UK in order to make steel. Given that we are putting a significant amount of money into being able to increase the production of steel in this country because of our sovereign capability demands, it makes absolute sense that we insulate the supply chain for that process, which includes refractory-grade ceramics. Again, including those manufacturers in the supercharger scheme would be a huge benefit to them and make us less dependent upon imports. Given the geopolitical instability that we face, being able to do this by ourselves in our own country makes absolute sense. On house building, every house needs some form of bathroom. If my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) were here, he would talk about Armitage Shanks and the famous sanitaryware that it makes. Product code 23420 is ceramics and sanitaryware. Before my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme tries to make a further intervention, I acknowledge that in his constituency, he has Silverdale Bathrooms, which makes sanitaryware. We should be supporting domestic manufacturers in this country to build the houses that we need. Without that support, we become dependent on imports. Finally, a product code that is close to my heart: 23410 —the ceramic household and ornamental object. I appreciate that including it in the scheme is a harder sell because of the strategic importance of those products to the country, but I say to the Secretary of State that one of the programmes that this Government have quite rightly introduced is Pride in Place, which is about saying to communities, “We know who you are, and we are proud of what you do.” When he visited Emma Bridgewater, he saw the pride on the faces of the workers who make the mugs, plates and tableware—and he had a go himself, and was very good. There is a sense of identity in having an industry reflected in a community, and it being supported and helped. While there may not be an immediate economic argument for the inclusion of tableware and giftware in the supercharger scheme, there is undoubtedly an argument about community identity and pride in place. This is about protecting jobs in communities like mine, which have lost so much over many years of de-industrialisation, while simultaneously saying to the thousands of workers who make the things that we eat off, give to our friends, and buy for weddings and birthdays, “We recognise the important social value of what you make and your contribution to the colour and joy of our lives.” I think that is a powerful argument that shows that ceramics should included in the supercharger. This is not a case of the sector simply asking for a handout. I think the Secretary of State would accept that the sector is doing what it can to decarbonise, and recognises that decarbonisation does not mean deindustrialisation. It recognises that it has to do more on heat recovery, and to ensure that it can sustain itself. The funding we have received has been an incredible benefit to the sector. The next step, to ensure that we go from surviving to thriving, is including the sector in the supercharger. I hope when the Secretary of State is able to make announcements about the review, which we hope is coming soon, he will lift the hearts of all the workers he met at Emma Bridgewater by saying, “You’re in the scheme, and we’ve got your back.”

It is a real pleasure to be here. My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) has made an outstanding case. I can reassure him that when we make decisions, they go beyond the sheer economics of investment, and into considerations about communities and sectors. The societal impact, should more ceramics companies fail in the cities that he and his colleagues represent, was very much in my mind. People of my age and generation remember very well that de-industrialisation was an active decision made by the Government in the 1980s in parts of the country, particularly the north-east, east midlands and elsewhere. It left a scarring impact that has crossed generations. I would not allow that to happen again on my watch. My hon. Friend makes his case very eloquently. Going up to Emma Bridgewater the day after I announced the package was a very memorable occasion. It shows his graciousness that he would say that my handiwork on that day was anything other than basic. His contribution shows the importance of the ceramics industry to many communities around the country, particularly in Stoke-on-Trent and other manufacturing heartlands. Ceramics is a sector with a proud history and heritage, a highly skilled workforce and an important role in local economies and the wider economy and supply chains around the country.

Will the Secretary of State give way?

I will, in just a moment. My hon. Friend was not here to hear his colleagues’ contributions earlier. He will regret that, because they were Churchillian. The Government recognise the importance of and understand the challenges that the sector has faced in recent years. The British industry supercharger was designed to support the industries most prone to carbon leakage due to high electricity costs faced by UK businesses. The supercharger supports the most electricity and trade-intensive industries by reducing their policy and network costs. Some electricity-intensive ceramics firms do receive the supercharger, and they make up around 10% of the industry.

I thank the Secretary of State for giving way, and I apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) for not quite being able to get here for the kick-off. The Secretary of State talks about the importance of the ceramics industry, both in economic and heritage terms. Does he agree that ceramics firms offer us a huge amount of soft power around the world? The “Made in Stoke-on-Trent” and the “Made in England” marks are so important, and in my constituency, we have Armitage Shanks, a name known all around the world for the products that it provides. Does he agree with that point?

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s contribution. Of course, he is completely correct. The impact that these brands have around the world has not been made recently, and is not to be taken lightly; it has come on the back of generations of extraordinarily hard work, precision and success. That is why the industry has the global recognition that it does. We celebrate the success of the past, and the impact and importance the industry has for communities, but I recognise the contribution that it should and will make in the future as well. The businesses I mentioned will have benefited from the recent uplift to the network charging compensation scheme, which now saves eligible ceramics businesses 90% on their electricity network charges. However, the reality is that much of the sector is gas-intensive, rather than electricity-intensive, and UK gas prices are more internationally competitive than electricity prices, notwithstanding the important point that my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central made. The Department for Business and Trade intends to review eligibility for the supercharger this year, and I encourage—in fact, I implore—the ceramics sector to engage with that process. Any changes to eligibility will be subject to consultation and ministerial approval, and the Government must always bear in mind the cost of potential changes and who would pay for them. The Government are also taking wider action to support over 10,000 manufacturing businesses in the industrial strategy growth sectors, and in foundational industries that provide key inputs for those sectors, through the British industrial competitiveness scheme. Some advanced and technical ceramics will be eligible to receive that support from 2027, and it will reduce their electricity bills by up to £40 per megawatt hour. Members should not forget the announcement I made earlier this year: qualifying businesses may get a bonus covering the costs of this year, too. The Government recognise that ceramics manufacturers are still under pressure, and I have been saddened to learn of the closure of, and job losses at, iconic ceramic manufacturers in recent years, most notably at Denby Pottery. Unfortunately, manufacturing ceased there, as administrators were unable to find a buyer for the business. Officials in my Department are working with the administrators as they take their statutory process forward, and I pass on my very sincere and heartfelt sympathies to all the workers, families and local communities that have been impacted by the closure. Our priority now is to support those who have been affected. We are working across Government and with local partners and relevant agencies to ensure that support is in place for workers who have been made redundant, and for those in the wider area impacted by Denby’s administration. That includes ensuring a joined-up, local response, and ensuring that employees can access the help and assistance that is and should be available to them. It is clear that the ceramics industry faces significant challenges, but despite those, the industry has great potential to be forward-facing as we transition towards a decarbonised economy. To unlock the industry’s potential and help support ceramics firms, the Government have recently announced a £120 million ceramics industry support scheme. That is a substantial intervention, focused on the needs of the ceramics sector. The scheme will back capital investment, and energy efficiency and decarbonisation projects, as well as providing operational support for successful applicants to the fund who require additional help to manage any increased ongoing costs. Ceramics are crucial for our modern way of living, from house building to smartphone screens, from plates to planes, and from engines to mugs and space shuttles, as well as all the other products that my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central mentioned. This funding will support the industry right across the United Kingdom, including in my hon. Friend’s home city of Stoke-on-Trent. The scheme will help to modernise an industry with a proud heritage, and the Government are working closely with the industry on its design. Officials in the Department for Business and Trade are engaging broadly, including with the sector’s main trade association, Ceramics UK, and individual businesses, to ensure that the scheme truly helps the sector in the long term and secures its long-term competitiveness. We want a thriving ceramics industry that continues to provide skilled employment, supports local communities, drives innovation and remains globally competitive.

Before the Secretary of State concludes, I thank him for his engagement, his respect towards me, as the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme, and my Staffordshire colleagues, and for his support on this important issue. We would not have that £120 million package without his tenacity, and his encouragement to our colleagues in His Majesty’s Treasury. For that, we are very grateful.

That was a very gracious intervention—I am glad I took it. I had the pleasure of visiting my hon. Friend’s constituency in the run-up to the general election, and I saw how much hard work and dedication he put into his campaign; I have also seen the clear-sighted representation, and heard the voice, that he has provided since coming to this place. Announcing these schemes is never easy. When we are minded to provide support, is difficult to go through the process without setting hares running or setting expectations too high. When there is ambiguity in the process, we appreciate, when we get to the other side, just how sincere everyone is at moments like this. In this Government and in me, hon. Members have a Government and a Secretary of State who strive, and put great store by the heritage and importance of certain businesses and sectors—not just the economic wellbeing of communities, but the social and cultural wellbeing of communities. Those are all interlinked, and we fail to recognise that at our peril. The ceramics industry deserves support, and this Government have demonstrated that through the £120 million package. We have chosen to deliver support through the ceramics industry support scheme to enable the industry to modernise, decarbonise and optimise, protecting the long-term competitiveness of the sector in the most efficient way. I thank all my parliamentary colleagues who advocated for that support. The Department, other Ministers and I look forward to continuing to work with Members as we develop the scheme and get it ready for deployment. Despite a difficult business environment, the ceramics sector continues to demonstrate resilience and innovation, and I remain confident in the future of this important industry. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central once again for securing this debate, and other Members for their interventions. Question put and agreed to.

House adjourned.