Scottish Labour will overhaul state grants so manufacturing firms like BiFab benefit instead of Amazon, says Richard Leonard.
The party’s leader said his reforms would mean “never again would we see fabrication yards standing idle”, referring to the mothballing of engineering sites in Fife.
Speaking in his first address to the UK Labour conference, Mr Leonard said he “fully intends” to be the next First Minister so the government can take charge of the economy.
“We need more planning and less market,” he told delegates in Liverpool on Monday.
“The people need a government prepared to act not simply react.”
He added: “We will overhaul regional selective assistance and reform public procurement, to support local industries and home-grown businesses, so that never again do we see factories and fabrication yards standing idle, whilst offshore wind farms in UK inshore waters paid for by public money and energy user levies are built in factories and yards overseas.”
BiFab’s fabrication yards in Fife are dormant after a contract building platforms for offshore wind turbines ended.
A Labour analysis of Scottish Enterprise funding found that foreign-owned companies in Scotland have benefited from £223 million of government grants under the SNP, compared with £141m for domestically-owned ones.
Online retailer Amazon, which has a distribution centre in Dunfermline, has received millions of pounds of the Scottish Government grants since 2005.
It has been criticised over the amount of tax it pays and the way it treats staff.
Earlier, Mr Leonard was probed on his commitment to oppose a second independence referendum in Labour’s next general election manifesto.
The pledge was made just days after Jeremy Corbyn said he is “not ruling out” approving a request from Nicola Sturgeon to hold Indyref2.
Asked by BBC Scotland if the manifesto commitment had been signed off by the UK Labour leader, Mr Leonard said: “Jeremy Corbyn and I have a good relationship, we speak regularly and you can rest assured that what I am pushing for is not something to which he is opposed.”
