Englishmum

It looks like it's the end of the road for Rover cars in the UK:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/car/story/...456605,00.html

http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0...327534,00.html

I think that a couple of my cousins work at Longbridge, although possibly for Land Rover which I think is a seperate entity? They have young families so I'm hoping that their jobs will be safe.

I remember my dad being made redundant from his job at the Triumph car factory and the local economy was badly affected - many local companies in the area existed solely to supply parts to the car factories and they went under too.

It just seems that manufacturing is dying in the UK as companies relocate to eastern Europe and Asia where labour is cheaper (the Peugeot car factory in Coventry has just eliminated one shift and it is thought that the factory will close in 2006 with a new manufacturing plant opening in eastern Europe to replace it).

I guess that eventually the UK will just have an economy based on the service industry...

Manc

not really. It cyclical. Nissan and ford still have plants in the UK. I also think Toyota have on in Scotland.

For those whom think the UK has no idustry anymore need to go to Avonmouth / Killingholm / Grangemouth / Stanlow etc etc.

evoal2003

[QUOTE=Manc]not really. It cyclical. Nissan and ford still have plants in the UK. I also think Toyota have on in Scotland.

A38 Derby I think

Franklin

Yes, a great shame that the UK is shedding so much manufacturing capacity. It's going to hit the parts supplying industry very hard with many others finding themselves on the dole. Crying shame. China is about to dominate the world textile industry, which is going to hit the west and third world very hard. I wonder about how the WTO works, it is causing a lot of structural shifts and terrible pain for an awful lot of families.

I worry about an economy with lots of jobs in the service sector. The pay is generally lower than the manufacturing sector and many of these jobs are vulnerable to outsourcing. Look at what is happening in the IT and call-center sectors, etc. Imho, outsourcing of the service sector especially in the professional service area is going to grow and will present serious challenges.

Tone

[QUOTE=evoal2003] South of Derby in Burnaston

Manc

so I was close then

Englishmum

My dad's old factory was demolished (he was a staunch Labour supporter to his dying day and blamed Margaret Thatcher for the decimation of the car industry...I personally thought it was industrial action - 'Red' Robbo and his constant calls for going on strike which had a lot to do with it) and the land has been turned into a large retail centre containing Sainsbury's, Wickes (DIY), Carphone Warehouse etc. I guess most of these jobs are not highly paid and a good number of them are part-time or seasonal only and the wages are probably not really enough to sustain a family?

The city where I grew up in has changed so much in the last 10-15 years....it was an industrial city where the economy was reliant on (vehicle) manufacturing which employed thousands of workers. Many companies are now dead or a shadow of their former selves eg. Alvis, Lucas, GEC, Marconi, Renold Chain, Carbodies and the Massey Ferguson tractor factory and even Jaguar has announced that it may soon be closing it's production lines down in the city. Here's an interesting article about why many of the jobs (from my home city) go overseas here:

http://www.economist.com/displayStor...ory_ID=1912003

Surely an economy - nationwide, not just local - can't be sustained on the replacements for the manufacturing companies which tend to mostly sell imported goods ...supermarkets, health centres, Blockbuster video stores, B&Q or buying insurance plans .... or can it?


My husband's company had a large R&D facility in Palo Alto ('silicon valley') California (he works in IT project management). Apart from a very small number of staff who've been retained in Palo Alto, the R&D has been switched to Bangkok....where labour rates are far, far lower than in any Western nation. He's got to go out there in a couple of weeks, so I guess at least the airlines are benefiting... :

My best friend here works as a fit model in the fashion industry...she tries on samples of clothes by designers for places such as Talbots, The Limited, The Gap/Banana Republic, American Eagle etc. When the design team is happy with the fit, anything from 100,000 to 500,000 of the item will then get the OK to go into production. Unfortunately none of these clothes are made in the USA anymore....they're all made up in (sweatshops probably) in places such as Indonesia and China....and shipped to the US.

I definitely see a shift towards China eventually becoming the new 'superpower' with India following close behind (continuing with their much wider disparity of the haves and the have nots compared to the West).

AdobePinon

I figured that Rover would just get sold off until I was reading a BBC article the other day. MG Rover....

...no longer owns most of Longbridge. It already sold that with a lease-back option.
...does not own its brand name (still owned by BMW).
...no longer owns its own finance arm (sold directly to Phoenix by BMW). The only reason Ford and GM make a profit is because of financing.
...no longer owns its parts business (sold to Caterpillar).
...no longer includes Land Rover (sold to Ford by BMW).
...has sold the rights to build Rover 25s and 75s, and K-series engines.

So why would anyone want to bail them out?

Englishmum

I thought that's what the Chinese were after - the 'intellectual property' rights? Basically from what I can tell, they want the 'knowhow' to develop the Rover cars in their own plants in China?

Gross50

Ousourcing has now beome a reality the world over. As China and India move to ratify the WTO and patent laws, a lot of businesses will move to the east. Even for speialised technologies, self improvement is the best way to stay marketable. Technology transfer is becoming the worst nightmare for techies. Just imagine transfering knowledge to countries/folks who will take over your job.

The talk out there is that for businesses to remain profitable they have to look for outsourcing opportunities.

ScyLarc

I work for a major investment bank who have followed the trend and outsourced large areas of their IT departments twice in the last 5 years. By sheer luck i have hung onto a job by transferring at the right time. Interestingly enough almost all of the outsourced work has now returned and the original contracts were cancelled. Major difficulties are out there, outsourcing is not always the path to profitablity - the reduction in costs are often not as large as advertised and the product quality can suffer.

We now have a trade off, bonuses and pay checks are not as big as they once were, the corporate jets and country club memberships have been sold (poor executives!) and expenses are very tightly controlled. We are bombarded with "Improvement is the Way Forward" messages and being the best does seem to be one way of remaining competative.

But having said all that, i am seriously considering taking some Mandarin lessons as i have a feeling they could come in handy!

Bob

don't forget honda in swindon, and bmw-mini in Oxford.
There's still tvr/aston martin/rolls, might not all be fully UK owned any more, but there still knocking about...

AdobePinon

Apparently the Chinese already have that. I think the plan was something to do with developing new models, but don't quote me on that.

Bob

They just wanted a brand name that was recognisable outside of China, in particular to the EU...

tony126

British industry consiststed more than the motor industry. The decline started about 1970 has has diminished ever since. I worked in the Coventry area. Alfred Heberts was probalby the biggest machine tool company in the world and went to the wall. That was the start of what I would call a domino affect for British industry. BSA, Renold Chain, Triumph cars, Triumph motor cycles, the Cotton industry and of course the coal mines.