Livingston Labour MP Gregor Poynton has used National Manufacturing Day to spotlight skilled jobs and the businesses making heat pumps and air-conditioning equipment in his constituency. A local Mitsubishi Electric site opened its doors to school pupils to show them the work behind modern manufacturing.
“Manufacturing matters to the Livingston constituency,” Poynton said in a post on X. “It means skilled jobs, successful businesses and investment in the technologies and industries that will shape our economy for decades to come.”
His post included a photograph with staff at Mitsubishi Electric Air Conditioning Systems Europe in Livingston. Parliament confirms that Poynton is Livingston’s MP and currently serves as a government whip.
Pupils invited behind the factory doors
National Manufacturing Day, organised by the industry body Make UK, took place on Thursday 24 September. Manufacturers across the UK invited schools and communities into their workplaces to show the range of jobs involved in making products, from engineering and production to research and technical support.
Mitsubishi Electric’s event listing said its Livingston site would host up to three schools, with a maximum of 40 pupils from each. The programme included a factory tour, a health and safety demonstration and a group activity.
The company says it employs 1,150 people across six factories in West Lothian, five in Livingston and one in Linlithgow. They make indoor and outdoor units and air-to-water heat pump systems for UK and European markets. That figure covers the company’s West Lothian factories; it should not be read as the workforce at the site Poynton photographed alone.
A local base for heat pump production
Mitsubishi Electric says production began at its Livingston factory in 1994 and that it moved into manufacturing air-to-water heat pumps in 2009. The site also houses research and development work focused on heating and energy efficiency.
That combination of factory production and technical development gives substance to Poynton’s argument about the importance of manufacturing to Livingston. It also shows pupils that the sector offers several routes into skilled work, rather than a single kind of factory job.
Poynton’s post did not announce a new investment or a specific number of new jobs. Its immediate news was the attention given to an existing local employer and to the people designing, engineering and making its products. The longer-term question for Livingston is how businesses, schools and training providers turn that visibility into opportunities for the next generation of workers.
