From: kevinh@hslrswi.hasler.ascom.ch (kevinh)
Subject: Re: Currency Problems
Originator: kevinh@nath
Reply-To: kevinh@hslrswi.hasler.ascom.ch
Organization: Ascom Hasler AG
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 15:13:49 GMT


In article <qoue54g@zola.esd.sgi.com>, livesey@solntze.esd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
|> In article <1992Oct6.130347.20360@hasler.ascom.ch>, kevinh@hslrswi.hasler.ascom.ch (kevinh) writes:
|> |> 
|> |> In article <qnd2tvc@zola.esd.sgi.com>, livesey@solntze.esd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
|> |> |> In article <1992Oct5.132145.23061@hasler.ascom.ch>, kevinh@hslrswi.hasler.ascom.ch (kevinh) writes:
|> |> |> |> 
|> |> |> |> In article <1ah9ttINNf5g@grapevine.EBay.Sun.COM>, martin.baines@uk.sun.com (Martin Baines - Sun UK - SE Manager Cambridge) writes:
|> |> |> |> |> 
|> |> |> |> |> Industries *can* come back: look at the British car industry,
|> |> |> |> |> from a low point in 1989 it is now expanding again,
|> |> |> |> 
|> |> |> |> Small but subtle difference, there used to be a British car
|> |> |> |> industry, now there's a car industry in Britain - spot the 
|> |> |> |> difference!
|> |> |> 
|> |> |> And the difference is <drum roll> the new car industry in Britain
|> |> |> is allowed to get on with the job of building cars any way it
|> |> |> wants, buying its parts from any supplier it wants, using whatever
|> |> |> labour it wants, at the lowest cost it can get,
|> |> 
|> |> Do you really believe that they placed factories here because British
|> |> labour is the cheapest?? or because it was the most qualified/experienced
|> |> (Nissan actively looked for totally unqualified people, in the economically
|> |> depressed area they decided (!) to place their factory).
|> |> 
|> |> The reason is <drum roll> british goverment subsidies.
|> 
|> There are two separate questions getting mixed up here.
|> 
|> Question 1: Why is there a foreign owned car industry in the UK
|> when there used to be a British owned one.  Answer: because we
|> don't screw the foreigners as badly as we screwed ourselves.

Well, there were three (simplistic) reasons why the British car industry 
kicked the bucket 1) Poor management 2) Goverment use of the car
industry to regulate the british economy  3) Unions and the associated 
agreements eg the method of payment through piece work.

As the management at the new car plants seems to be british and these
new car plants are successful (Nissan at Washington claim higher quality
stats than similar Japanese plants) then one can assume that similar
work "could" have been done at british owned car plants. The government
still dicks around with the economy although not as much as it did
in the sixties and also the role the car industry plays is of less significance
to the economy than it was at that time. The unions still play a (much
reduced) role in car plants but their role now is one without the teeth
they used to have - mainly because of Michael Edwardes (guess who appointed
him?).

So, who screwed who? Seems to me that we didn't have to lose the british car
industry, that all the money that was pumped in by British taxpayers didn't
have to be lost, or sold off to XXX - probably just to provide tax breaks for
Japanese companies, and who was responsible for all this?? Goverment of the
day?  


|> Question 2:  Why do foreign owned car factories get set up in
|> the UK rather than in, say, Iceland.

I would have thought that the most pertinent question would have been

Why do foreign owned car factories get set up in
the UK rather than in, say, Spain? Or France?

> Jon

kevinh@hasler.ascom.ch