fuchs01

Ja ja, but note, peacefully,!!! except for the aggression, coming from that annoying
Island. We even put our brothers there, the Anglos and Saxons, and they still
Yap on about WWII. Even that had nothing to do with us, that was an Austrian, just
Like the one before, bloody Austrians.... why the ossis and Aussis make both our
Countries cringe..
This is from Merkels book 1st chapter 'mein eigener kampf'....

rugbymatt

What on EARTH are you on about?

Taking that sort of bizarre logic you could also say that under EU membership we have also not see a biblical plague or the Spanish Flu therefore the EU has cured European pandemics!

The coal industry in the UK was killed by Chinese, Russian, German, American, Australian and numerous other countries being able to supply us with cheaper coal than we can get for ourselves, the car industry is thriving, even in this recession it's held it's own compared to the likes of Ford and GM.... If what you are talking about is the demise of the likes of British Leyland then thank god for that! There is hardly a car build in the "heyday" of BL that I'd happily buy, they were awful, even Rover was an absolute shambles and I include the Landrover in that to some extent, even though I am a landrover man, there are whole decades that cars rolled off the West Midlands line that are shameful in quality.... And if you don't think that we have a car industry because the Japs own most of it then go and tell that to the tens of thousands of workers and peripheral workers who benefit day in day out thanks to the skills set we can provide. As to the rest then we only have ourselves to blame. I come from an engineering family, ask then, any of them, what the issue is, it's that people in the UK want the cheapest possible things to fill their vacuous lives, they don't want to buy quality, they want something cheap and we can not compete with the Far East and South America when it comes to labour. Want that industry to come on home? Stop buying Chinese products....

amideislas

And all this time I had been led to believe socialism was going to make us all prosperous without having to compete...

Funny, it seems all those horrible countries that have managed to sell us products at half the cost of what we can make them for are all becoming very prosperous indeed.

rugbymatt

...and at least two of them Communist/socialist.... Actually, if you count Mexico, three.... That wasn't the point I was making, I don't feel the need to put centre left or centre right in all of my posts, it's irrelevant. In fact by doing so you leave yourself exposed not only to the glaring hole in your point that I made but also to the Twatchers haters point that it was her who finally killed off almost everything on that list....

Shall we go back to the original point of the thread?

amideislas

Well, you seemed to be making an equally off-topic point that "everyone else" caused the demise. I was only pointing out that perhaps it wasn't entirely "everyone else's" fault...

Sitting around complaining that you aren't getting paid enough or don't have enough holidays or benefits, whilst claiming the rest of the world are the criminals for running circles around you isn't a very competitive strategy. You aren't entitled to prosperity. It's something you earn. Whether personally or collectively as a country. Thatcher knew that very well. I would hate to think what would've happened to Britain had Labour been allowed to continue to drive it into poverty.

rugbymatt

Who on earth are you talking to? I never said any of that and as to being off topic I addressed a post that was clearly on topic.

scot47

I like to imagine the following scenario

2014 Scotland votes to leave the United Kingdom
2015 (or is it 2016 ?) The RestUK votes to leave the EU

We DO live in interesting times ! It all seemed much simpler when Victoria was on the throne and we were "Top Nation"(See "1066 And All That")

Interesting that Prussia,declared dead by the Allied Control Commission in 1947, has come back to bite them on the b** !

amideislas

Oh, and I forgot to mention...

Much, if not most of those "high quality" products produced in Europe are made from stuff produced in China. Can't afford to build them from stuff made in Europe. Labour, taxes, regulations...

In fact, is there even ONE piece of consumer electronics made in Europe? (not just assembled, but actually manufactured) Anything?

So, as you suggest, shall we quit buying stuff from Asia or anywhere else that outperforms us? Is that really going to encourage us to return to buying our "high quality" goods that ironically, we import from Asia anyway? Even if it's 10x more expensive?

Right, then. I'd more expect a massive increase in illegal imports than creating any new industry here. If we are too expensive (as we believe we have the right to be), we simply can't compete. Forcing us to pretend we are competitive won't make us more competitive.

Such views sound eerily like an EU bureaucrat. Rather than accept that we are unable to compete, let's demonise anyone who can, and block trade with them. That will make it all better.

...which is just another motivation to debate whether the UK should stay in the EU or not. The EU is still asleep, dreaming of a perfect society. Some believe it's better to just tiptoe out of the room rather than to wait for them to sober up.

Or maybe we can wake them up, get 'em a cup of coffee and see if we can bring them into the 21st century. But there's a lot of Eurocrats to sober up. I think that's what Cameron has in mind rather than just walking away. And if you can't sober 'em up, then there's always the door...

HBG

Reading something like that makes you realise the difficulty our leaders have in leaving important decisions to the voters by way of a referendum.

How can you trust such people with a vote? Any vote? On anything?

crookesey

Thanks for the insult VISA man. You along with the rest of the europhiles bless the EU when things go well and leap to it's defense when they go badly.

To be insulted by someone like you is a compliment indeed.

EMR

I have to agree with HBG . The EU was not responsible for the overmanning, low productivity and suicidal trade union policies that beset the major manufacturing sectors of the UK.
The EU was not responsible for the poor quality of cars. bikes etc produce during the 70.s and 80s.
If you do not produce what your customers want they will buy from the competition , France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Korea.

The Morris Marina and Austin Allegro were creations of the UK not the EU.

Dick Dasterdly

As are most of today's F1 cars, the cutting edge of motor technology.

EMR

Quite right because they are not companies strangled by out of date manufacturing practices and poor management.
The penny finally dropped.

bobd22

Motorbike wise they did have some good bikes late 60,s early 70's they put in production the BSA Rocket 3 and Triumph Trident. They developed the BSA Bandit/Triumph Fury 350 which was quite advanced and could have competed with Jap bikes of the era. Unfortunately so much debt they couldn't get them into marketable production. Triumph then stuck with variations really of their old models. So the brains to design and produce in UK but sadly money wasn't and the Japs were producing what was wanted. Sticking with old designs though didn't, seem to have same affect on BMW, they tried yo kill off the Boxers but had to concede to what the buyers wanted and move them forward.

fuchs01

U sirry iriot wot u tri te sai, china gud, soyu kip brying ower produks, u bad man.