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First Minister Carwyn Jones on Monday announces more than £6m in support to help Airbus, Ford and Toyota prepare for Brexit and describe the “catastrophic” consequences of leaving the EU without a deal.

Mr Jones will use his last speech as Welsh leader to the UK Labour conference to warn of “industrial carnage” from Brexit.

Airbus will receive £3m to make preparations with £1.6m going to Ford and £1.5m to Toyota.

He hopes the cash will improve the chances of the manufacturing giants’ Welsh sites being developed as preferred locations for future investment.

Mr Jones will tell the conference audience in Liverpool: “The looming prospect of a catastrophic ‘no deal’ outcome is down to one thing: the paralysis and incompetence of this Tory Government.”

He will launch a direct attack on Theresa May’s negotiating strategy, saying: “The Chequers White Paper might have been a viable starting position for negotiations if it had been launched two years ago, before Theresa May sent the Article 50 letter. Not with only weeks of negotiating time left.”

Describing the scale of the economic hit that could be coming Wales’ way if there is no deal, he will say: “It would mean a new wave of industrial carnage, with a real risk of advanced manufacturing following coal and iron as industries where Wales once led the world. It is my first duty as First Minister to do whatever I can to fight against that prospect.

“I must also prepare our country for every outcome.”

Mr Jones’ announcement comes as the conference prepares to debate what Labour’s position should be on a second Brexit referendum.

Welsh Labour is readying itself not just for Brexit but for the election to choose the First Minister’s successor.

Mr Jones said it was a “possibility” that he could nominate Mid and West Wales AM Eluned Morgan so she can take part in the contest.

(Image: Andrew James)

Ms Morgan hopes to stand alongside Cardiff West AM Mark Drakeford, who is widely seen as the frontrunner, and Cardiff South and Penarth AM Vaughan Gething but she is one nomination short.

The First Minister has said he will not endorse a candidate but acknowledged he could nominate her so she could take part in the contest.

He told the BBC: “Well, it is a possibility of course but I think there are other possibilities that need to be looked at first in terms of whether some of my colleagues would switch their nomination in order for Eluned to be able to stand.”

Warning against the spectacle of an all-male leadership contest, he said: “I think it would look very, very strange if we had a leadership contest with just men involved... I think it is crucial that there should be a woman on the ballot paper.”

He added: “At the moment Eluned is the only candidate who is a woman who has declared. On that basis I hope she does get on the ballot paper because I think it’s important that we don’t just have men on the ballot paper.”

Arguing that it was “not tokenism,” he said it was “important to reflect as much as you can Wales as a whole”.

It 'would look rather odd' for Labour to be the only party without a woman in its leadership contest

Former MEP Ms Morgan said she was “very hopeful” she will get to stand, saying: “In an ideal world I would like to be nominated on the basis of my merit and for the experience I can bring and for what I can offer in terms of the future of the Labour party in Wales and also the country... But this is now in the hands of the Assembly Members themselves and they need to determine whether they want to put me on that ballot paper.”

(Image: Media Wales)

When asked whether she would rather be nominated by Mark Drakeford or Carwyn Jones, she said: “Well, that’s out of my control and it is entirely up to them how they play this but I do think it would look rather odd for every other political party in Wales to have had a contest over the summer with a woman on the ballot and for Labour, who proclaim to be a feminist government, to not even be able to field a woman candidate.”

When asked to identify the key difference between herself and Mr Gething and Mr Drakeford she stressed her commitment to “tackling poverty through growing the economy”.

She said: “I think they are all extremely competent politicians. There is no question about that. I think my emphasis would definitely be on tackling poverty through growing the economy and I think that’s particularly important now that we’ll be having our own tax-raising powers.

“So, this is no longer about how you redistribute the cake, and redistributing wealth from the poor to the really poor is not sustainable in the long-term, so we need to focus now on how we grow the economy.”

Ms Morgan supports a second EU referendum and strongly argues that keeping the present arrangements should be an option. Len McCluskey, leader of the Unite union, has argued this choice should not be available.

However, Ms Morgan said she “certainly would” want remaining in the EU to be an option because “it’s the best possible deal”.

She said: “We have a rebate, we have structural funds where we have a certain assurance in terms of it being a fair way of dividing wealth according to need rather than any political shenanigans, which is what could happen. The deal we have at the moment is the best deal we can get so I would want to see that on the ballot paper because why would we inflict that self-harm on ourselves in the knowledge that the promises were made in the last referendum were untrue?”