Saturday, Dec 20, 2008
World in shock as Gordon Brown actually does something right!!
The Times: Gordon Brown ignores CBI's call for help for British car manufacturers
"Gordon Brown ignored renewed calls from business leaders to save the car industry yesterday, just as America’s ailing automotive giants were offered a $17.4 billion (£11.6 billion) bailout"..............at last some sense
Posted by titaniccaptain @ 01:57 AM (452 views) Add Comment
7 Comments
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1. crashpad4me said...
TC - I agree with your coda. Although no one wishes the misery of unemployment on anyone, imo it would make more sense for the government to be bailing out businesses with cash flow problems who actually have a market for their products.
2. Prudentman said...
Jaguar L Rover is actually owned by Tata - an Indian company. Unfortunately it appears the government with succumb to this one. I see that the lobbyists are in full effect.
Expect this bailout to be passed this weekend. A govt that has a history of burying bad news would have no problem with concelaing this under the heap of the festive mood.
3. This comment has been removed as it was found to be in breach of our Blog Policies.
4. gardeniadotnet said...
Do you speak bail-out?
Peter Mandelson, Britain’s business secretary, is contemplating a bail-out of Jaguar Land Rover. It is hard to imagine a less deserving candidate. The luxury carmaker fails the public interest test on two key grounds. First, its products are of questionable social utility. For the government to allocate scarce funds to prop up the production of the 4.2 Litre V8 Petrol Supercharged Jaguar is a nonsense. It has a top speed of more than 150mph, emits 299g of carbon dioxide per kilometre and costs about three times the average annual wage. True, the UK car industry employs 190,000 people directly and supports several hundred thousand more once components and retailing are taken into account. But if Lord Mandelson wants the government to underwrite this £50bn industry, he should harness such public funds as are available to develop the green cars of the future, not pander to vested interests.
The second reason Lord Mandelson should refuse to bail out JLR is that Tata Motors, the Indian company that paid $2.3bn for it, is capable of doing so itself, if it wishes. Tata Motors, let it not be forgotten, is a subsidiary of Tata Group, one of the wealthiest companies on the subcontinent, with revenues of $62.5bn and profits of $5.4bn last year. The argument that thousands of jobs are at stake is weak: sectors employing many more, such as retail, receive no special treatment. If job protection starts to drive government policy, then the UK would bar Tata Consulting Services, a sister company, from offering the type of business process outsourcing services that have sucked back-office jobs to India in their hundreds of thousands during the past decade. But that would be nutty. Manufacturers are now leaner precisely because they now manage their inventory, process warranty claims and order spare parts through TCS’s offshore centres. The simple truth is that Tata Motors overpaid for a trophy asset with poor prospects. It must sort it out itself.
FT: December 18 2008
5. uncle chris said...
Don't forget that all these government ministers are whisked around in nice comfortable Jaguars in order to avoid us plebs. God foresake they have to walk between Whitehall and Parliament. Oooh ... that must be nearly a quarter of a mile.
By the way, and sorry for changing the subject, but does anyone know what happened to firstrung.co.uk?
6. paul said...
converted lurker should be able to tell us what's up with the firstrung site.
7. jack c said...
Guy's I have just visited the first rung site firstrung.co.uk/default.asp?pagekey=1 and it seems OK to me. Paul Holmes AKA Converted lurker doesnt post much these days.