What's Happening In France?

[Terry - Somerset]

We stood still whilst China and Asia went into overdrive, they invested heavily whilst our companies paid the shareholders and looked down on engineering and manufacturing. But before China there was Japan, they took western industry by storm and so we had insight into what was coming next but still sat back and did nothing. The UK as a country is going nowhere fast, it still has some margins before it hits rock bottom and there is nobody on the brake pedal or at the helm and so we fall. The issues are now far too complex and would involve such drastic changes to lifestyles that we have to hit rock bottom and end up completely broken in order to rebuild from the ground up and it will take decades as education and skills do not happen overnight.

About 80% of UK GDP is services. About 16% comes from manufacturing. If the UK applied more resources/people to manufacturing, given fairly full employment, there would be less services available - note that most cannot be delivered from overseas.

Many of us can remember a time pre-Thatcher when Britain made things. Go back further and Britain lead the industrial revolution. I can understand (and to some extent personally feel) regret and nostalgic at the passing of such an age.

But I question whether it really matters. Where once manufactured goods were expensive, they are now cheap. Reality - they have little economic value. Leaving aside any strategic importance, it is not an endeavour in which the UK is competitive due to:

• high labour costs and regulation,
• automation and design is reducing overall costs

It would be much better long term to focus on that which will benefit the UK in the future. We should grasp the revolution now upon us in robotics and AI which if managed effectively could radically improve both economic standing and quality of life.

 

[Spectric]

But I question whether it really matters. Where once manufactured goods were expensive, they are now cheap.

Yes that is why we are really to blame, we want cheap and got it at the expense of employment and our own skilled workforce. Look at our woodworking machinery, mostly asian imports where once we made good solid products that lasted to long. We are well into disposable products, if you are producing something and it last 20 years then that is a customer gone for twenty years .

 

[Phil Pascoe]

But I question whether it really matters. Where once manufactured goods were expensive, they are now cheap. Reality - they have little economic value. Leaving aside any strategic importance, it is not an endeavour in which the UK is competitive due to:

• high labour costs and regulation,
• automation and design is reducing overall costs

It would be much better long term to focus on that which will benefit the UK in the future. We should grasp the revolution now upon us in robotics and AI which if managed effectively could radically improve both economic standing and quality of life.

I remember 30+ years ago a local brewery announcing with pride that it had done a deal exporting canned beer to Russia. Taking all the taxes etc. out of the equation the value would have come out at about £2 a tray. They had a canning and bottling plant that was supposed to be the third or fourth largest in the Country ............. hundreds of miles from the population centres. ??? Not surprisingly the brewery went bust not long afterwards (there were many other reasons, I had personal knowledge of the management's incompetence and general idiocy).
We said at time this Country should be world leaders in HiFi, camera, computer etc. manufacture - high value, low volume goods - we shouldn't be importing and exporting billions of tons of materials for little profit.