The Canadian owners of Wigton's Innovia Group has said it is excited by the opportunities which the company has to offer.

CCL Industries made the comments after it reported a growth in sales across all of its divisions for the first quarter of 2017.

They rose by 22.5 per cent to 1,061.5m Canadian dollars (more then £597m), compared to 866.8m Canadian dollars (more than £488m) for the first quarter of 2016.

The firm has said that 25.1 per cent of this related to acquisions, primarily by their takeovers of Innovia and American company Checkpoint Systems.

Operating income for the first quarter of 2017 was 158.9m Canadian dollars (£89.4m), an increase of six per cent when compared to the 149.9m Canadian dollars (£84.4m) made in the comparable quarter of 2016.

Geoffrey Martin, president and chief executive of CCL, said: "We closed the acquisition of the Innovia Group on February 28, 2017, for 1.15bn Canadian dollars (£695m) with customers and employees pleased to see the business under long-term ownership. First results for the month of March met expectations. A modest 5m Canadian dollar (£2.8m) restructuring plan focused on eliminating duplicate corporate functions will complete over the balance of the year.

"We continue to be excited by the opportunities for Innovia and our new CCL Secure business."

Innovia employs 1,200 people worldwide including more than 600 at Wigton, where it manufactures polypropylene film for use in labelling and packaging, and the Guardian polymer bank note material recently adopted by the Bank of England.

Innovia's cellophane films business was sold to Futamura last year when 270 staff at Wigton transferred to the Japanese company.

CCL employs more than 20,000 people operates 156 production facilities in 35 countries.

In an interview with following the announcement of the takeover deal, Mr Martin said he had "zero intentions" of cutting jobs in Cumbria.