Labour MP Dr Allison Gardner has welcomed plans for a major £500 million advanced ceramics manufacturing centre in North Staffordshire, after repeatedly pressing the case for investment in the region’s strategically important ceramics industry.
Technology company Lucideon has unveiled plans for a new ceramic matrix composites (CMC) manufacturing centre at Keele University Science Park, in a project being described as a potential new era for Britain’s advanced ceramics sector.
The proposed £500 million development would strengthen the UK’s ability to manufacture advanced materials used in strategically important industries including aerospace, defence and energy.
Dr Allison Gardner, Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent South, welcomed the progress after working with industry, Keele University and parliamentary colleagues to make the case for locating advanced ceramics investment in North Staffordshire.
Writing on X, Gardner said:
“Pleased to see progress. Myself and my team have worked hard in making the case for an advanced ceramics facility in North Staffordshire, with Keele University being the perfect location.”
She also highlighted the work of Lucideon chief executive Tony Kinsella, Ceram UK and fellow MPs in supporting the case for the project.
The announcement follows months of parliamentary campaigning by Gardner over the importance of advanced ceramics to Britain’s industrial and national security capabilities.
In a Commons intervention in March, Gardner argued that North Staffordshire’s advanced ceramics industry was vital to securing a “strategic, robust and sovereign defence supply chain”.
She specifically called for progress towards a sovereign CMC manufacturing facility in North Staffordshire, highlighting work by Lucideon and suggesting a location close to Keele University’s Applied Materials Research, Innovation and Commercialisation facilities.
Gardner told Parliament at the time that advanced ceramics were important to technologies ranging from armour and defence communications to high-speed munitions, civil aviation and aerospace.
She also warned that Britain remained dependent on overseas manufacturing for some of these strategically important materials despite possessing significant domestic intellectual property, technology and skills.
The MP has been raising the sector’s importance for even longer. In a Westminster Hall debate in December 2025, Gardner highlighted North Staffordshire’s established cluster of advanced ceramics businesses and welcomed the recognition of ceramics as a foundational sector in the Government’s industrial strategy.
Lucideon chief executive Tony Kinsella has described the proposed Keele development as “nothing less than the rebirth of the advanced ceramics industry in the UK”.
If delivered at the proposed scale, the development would represent a major vote of confidence in North Staffordshire’s manufacturing future and could help establish the area as an internationally important centre for advanced materials.
For Gardner, the announcement also represents significant progress in a campaign she has pursued both locally and in Westminster: linking Stoke-on-Trent and North Staffordshire’s historic ceramics expertise with the high-tech manufacturing industries of the future.
The proposals will now be closely watched as Lucideon and its partners work to turn the £500 million ambition into a major new manufacturing facility at Keele.
