WEC hosts fact-finding trip for shadow business secretary

Labour’s shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna was shown the importance of engineering to Britain’s economic future as he hit the election campaign trail in Lancashire.

Mr Umunna paid a fact-finding visit to The WEC Group in Darwen as part of his work to launch his party’s general election campaign in the North West.

During his tour he heard how the company had just invested £500,000 in the latest technology to set up a new job-creating powder coating operation in its home town.

WEC Group commercial director Wayne Wild explained the group’s growth was based on continual investment in cutting edge machinery and in diversification.

He said: “We are caught in the middle, between SMEs and the bigger powerhouse groups, and as a result I feel we are being largely ignored.

The shadow cabinet member, who was accompanied by local Labour parliamentary candidate Will Straw on his visit, said Britain needed more companies like WEC. And he said laying out policies to support job-creating businesses would play an important part in the unfolding election campaign.

“A business like WEC Group illustrates what we are trying to achieve more of. It has grown through sustainable long-term investment, has a good business model, treats its workers well and therefore has good levels of productivity.

He said the government needed to back sectors like engineering and added it was important to provide access to sources of capital so businesses could invest in the long term.