Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves MP commended two Staffordshire firms who stand out in their industries during a visit to the county.
The Leeds West Labour MP chose Cosy Direct to officially launch the Government’s Trade Strategy on Thursday.
Spending a morning at the company’s headquarters in Burton upon Trent, she was given a tour, conducted a meet-and-greet with staff and had an introduction to Cosy’s product design capabilities and demonstrations of its use of technology and AI.
She was also presented with her very own pot of Chancellor’s Honey, harvested from the company’s own beehives.
Cosy supplies sustainable, open-ended educational resources for schools and nurseries and received a King’s Award for Enterprise for International Trade earlier this year.
CEO Peter Ellse said the Chancellor praised the company’s success and operations, holding it up as the kind of company the new Trade Strategy is designed to benefit describing it as an ‘honour’ to be chosen as the launch venue.
He added: “We’ve worked extremely hard over the past 15 years to get to this stage, so it’s wonderful to see something we’re part of everyday held up as a good example when it comes to employment, exports and embracing new technology.
“Medium-sized businesses like ours are vitally important to the economy and to the trade strategy. We’re the ones generating growth and creating jobs, investing in technology and driving exports forward.
“There’s no doubt that businesses need support — and Cosy is an example of what more companies like ours could achieve if they received it.”
Ms Reeves said: “Cosy is a great success story and I want more businesses to take that plunge and to export and to grow jobs and to create investment here in Britain.”
The Chancellor then went on to visit JCB’s World Headquarters where she was given an update on the company’s £100 million investment into hydrogen engines and hydrogen-powered equipment.
During the visit to Rocester, the Chancellor was shown by JCB Chairman Anthony Bamford how much progress had been made into hydrogen refuelling technology and tried her hand at refuelling a pre-production hydrogen backhoe loader.
She said it was ‘fantastic’ to see the zero-emission machinery and added: “JCB are making quick progress in ensuring hydrogen plays a vital role in decarbonising the construction industry, delivering the jobs of the future and supporting this government’s primary mission of growing the economy to put more money in people’s pockets.”
The development of the hi-tech hydrogen combustion engine is being undertaken by a team of more than 100 engineers at JCB Power Systems in Foston, Derbyshire.
The Chancellor toured the Foston engine plant in September 2022 and watched a demonstration of a prototype digger powered by a hydrogen combustion engine as well as having a go at refuelling it.
Her visit comes after JCB recently secured full EU type-approval of its hydrogen engine for use in non-road mobile machinery.
This means that JCB’s hydrogen engine has been approved for sale and for use in machines and third-party OEM equipment in each of the 27 EU member states, and all other territories recognising EU type-approvals.
Full GB type-approval is also now in place.
Well I truly hope that the Chancellor’s abject failures achieved to date in her current role do not rub off on the two tremendous companies she visited.