HOW many secretaries of state does it take to open a train factory?

Vince Cable and Patrick McLoughlin, business and transport secretary respectively, both pitched up last Friday at a marquee in Newton Aycliffe to remove a white sheet from a scale model of Hitachi's proposed £82m plant.

It has become a common sight at Coalition events to see two people perform a one-man act.

Dr Cable used his speech to hail the imminent start of building work on the plant as a great day for the North-East and for the country as a whole.

His tried-and-tested comments were typical of the York-born Lib Dem stalwart who was sporting the same tie that he always seems to wear when he visits our region - a natty polka dot number that gives him the appearance of an older and less hip brother of Channel 4 newscaster Jon Snow.

Mr McLoughlin used the event to praise North-East manufacturing, and also to talk-up the train building credentials of his Derbyshire constituency, which was a strange line to take in front of an Aycliffe audience considering that Derby's Bombardier factory will rival Hitachi's County Durham plant.

The Transport Secretary welcomed the assembled throng of local business leaders and MPs, which included, he said: "James Wharton and Paul (sic) Wilson". Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson was perplexed by the gaffe as Mr McLoughlin had called him by the correct name when the pair met a few minutes earlier.

Mr Wharton is the Conservative MP for Stockton South, whose private member's Bill will see MPs vote this Friday on whether to hold a referendum on the UK's membership with the EU.

It's ironic that the Tory backbencher was happy to celebrate the investment Hitachi is making in the North-East, while championing a cause that jeopardises the region's chances of securing similar job boosts in the future.

The Japanese firm's massive vote of confidence in the North-East, which will create thousands of factory, supply chain and construction jobs, would not have occurred if we had severed ties with Brussels.

Alistair Dormer, Hitachi Rail Europe chief executive told me: "We regard Europe as potentially our biggest market and we would not want anything to happen that would damage the relationship or put up any barriers. We should stay in."

Hitachi, and some of the region's most successful employers, including Nissan Sunderland, set up operations in the North-East to establish bridgeheads into the EU.

This week the CBI revealed EU membership is worth between £62bn and £78bn to the UK or £3,000 a year to every household in the country.

Almost half of the region's export business is done with members of the EU, supporting an estimated 140,000 North-East jobs.

The Government estimates that 3.5 million jobs in Britain are linked, directly or indirectly, to the trade with EU member states.

Ministers must ensure we get best value out of our membership, but like Dr Cable I can see no value in changing ties just for the sake of it.

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