County Councillor and Parliamentary Candidate for Fylde Constituency, Bill Winlow spoke strongly in support of BAE Systems, Warton and Westinghouse, Springfields and other Fylde industry during a debate about the importance of manufacturing at the recent Liberal Democrat Spring Conference [March 13th]. "Fylde relies heavily on these two major employers to directly provide over 5,500 jobs for local people." said Bill. "There are numerous local small businesses reliant upon them, which, along with other innovative local businesses, need to be better supported in difficult times. It is imperative that they receive finance as and when they need it to facilitate development from concept to commercial products. In addition to regulating the financial and banking sector, the Liberal Democrats will create Local Enterprise Funds and Regional Stock Exchanges to rebuild a diverse manufacturing sector and support an entrepreneurial economy". Bill continued "It is utterly disgraceful that the banks will not provide financing to sound companies in the early stages of commercial development when it is most needed - the Labour government has utterly failed in its promise to get them to lend. Unfortunately the service economy invented by the Conservatives has also failed the North West very badly - we have moved from real engineering to 'financial engineering' with potentially dire long term consequences for the skilled workforce here on the Fylde.
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