Your editorial (20 February) and report with map of the remaining British car plants (‘Body blow’ as Honda shuts plant in Swindon, 19 February) raises the question of what Britain should do for a good living. When I joined Ford Motor Company straight from Oxford in 1964, the company employed around 60,000 in the UK and was investing in becoming the leader in commercial vehicle sales, with a new design centre at Dunton in Essex. Now it employs fewer than 6,000 directly, and the world-beating Fiesta is made in Spain and the Transit van in Turkey. The truck division where I worked was sold to Iveco, based in Italy, and the old plant went to India.
European doubts about the reliability and quality of British products made it hard to break into European markets, while the UK lost out in the Commonwealth to Japanese firms that produced what the market wanted. There is little future in simply assembling products that are designed and specified elsewhere.
Contrast that with Germany, where the major companies such as Mercedes and BMW have a network of suppliers close at hand, and the main manufacturers benefit from government-funded research and local authority-funded premises. Without the spirit of partnership and technical excellence that underlies Germany’s resurgence, it is hard to see how the UK, as an isolated island, could ever reach the standards our politicians claim to want.
Surely, we must use the current crises to rebuild our local economies, by making the most of the few treasures we have left, such as BMW in Oxford and Jaguar near Birmingham, and not chasing dreams?
Dr Nicholas Falk
Executive director, the Urbed Trust
• We’ve had many responses to Honda’s announcement that it is to close its Swindon plant – sadness, dismay, anger and regret. All of these are understandable; it’s a massive blow to the town and surrounding area. What’s not understandable – and indicative of the depths to which our politics have sunk – is the desperate logic of arch-Brexiters like the ERG’s Steve Baker almost glorying in the fact that Honda’s official line is that the decision has nothing to do with Brexit and is down to “global trends”. A matter of tact over fact, some might say.
However, “global trends” is still an indictment of Brexit by default; after all, it’s the Steve Bakers of this world who are championing Britain’s ability to thrive on the global stage, unchained from the burdensome EU. If this is a foretaste of how attractive we are as an investment location for firms looking to develop in the future, it doesn’t bode well. Or are we to seriously believe that Brexit is an endeavour so special, noble and pure, it is both connected yet unconnected to the economic challenges of our changing world. The buck, in every sense, must stop somewhere.
Colin Montgomery
Edinburgh
• Honda announces it will leave Swindon in 2021, which is two years away; whereas Brexit is supposed to be five weeks away (‘Fanciful’ to say Honda didn’t consider Brexit when closing Swindon, 20 February). So for the sake of the workers in Swindon, and all other places where industries and investors are planning to leave the UK, and for the 48% who voted remain last time, plus the people who’ve changed their minds, let’s have a people’s vote immediately. Time for Corbyn to step up and for Labour to honour its pledges. If there is then a clear majority to remain in the EU, we might stop destroying our nation and persuade Honda and others to stay. When voters ticked leave or remain in 2016, I don’t suppose they thought “leave” might mean this at all.
Susan Treagus
Manchester
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