WALES’s Labour government will pursue a progressive economic policy that focuses on better jobs, narrowing the skills divide and tackling poverty, its Economy Minister is due to say today.

Vaughan Gething will declare his commitment to working with unions and business to ensure post-coronavirus investment is linked to fairness in work, decarbonisation and skills.

At a hybrid economic summit at Transport for Wales’s new headquarters in Pontypridd, he is set to say that better regional economic development and more wide-ranging support for workers will be central to his “team Wales” approach. 

The former health minister will also address the country’s long-term demographic challenges, amid projections that those of working age could make up just 58 per cent of the total population by the 2040s.

And Mr Gething will call on Westminster to honour promises made to the devolved administration on European Union successor funds as well as more cash for major renewable energy projects and Welsh research and development.  

Ahead of the summit, he said: “My ambition is to make Wales a place where young people feel confident in planning their future here. You don’t have to get out to get on.”