Introduction
It is a great pleasure to join the Great Exhibition of the North and to be a small part of your proud tradition of innovation and openness.
This gathering rightly echoes the Great Exhibition of 1851. The event at Crystal Palace took place in the middle of the 1st Industrial Revolution, around the start of the first wave of globalisation. In the Newcastle of the 1850s, innovation meant the most advanced steam locomotive of the day, the Rocket, and the world’s first passenger railway, the Stockton to Darlington Railway. Today, on the cusp of the 4th Industrial Revolution, the businesses of the Northern Powerhouse are connecting through superfast broadband, and even working to turn the hyperloop from concept to reality.
Then as now, the North looked outwards. During the first wave of globalisation, this region built the ships that enabled Britain’s economic transformation and its ports were amongst the busiest in the world.