Companies Listed As National Assets

Not sure of the legality of this but I think this would be a good idea It would basically involve a list of companies which should remain UK owned, it would be updated to ensure the best companies were kept or those in jeopardy of going bump.

Manufacturing in the UK is at an all time low & the future doesn't look much brighter as the cost of staffing, land & generally everything is far cheaper abroad then it is here in the UK.

The car manufacturing industry does not look great with no UK company owning a car brand we are relying on foreign companies keeping the remaining outlets open such as Jaguar, Toyota etc.

So what if the government could have made Rover a listed company to ensure that the jobs in the car industry are kept in the UK - so even if other car manufacturers were to leave the UK the prospect of Rovers growth could have made little impact on those being made redundant.

Big brands such as Cadbury have been sold to foreign companies & straighaway they're talking about job losses & factories closing in the UK. Cadburys started in Brum & the suburb of Bournville is based around the factory with most people working for Cadburys. If that was to close it would effect thousands of people within that area.

There could be a sort of top 10 as a maximum to make sure we don't stop all foreign investment in to the UK.

 

that was a struggle, still not feeling on top form.

i'm all about the free trade brum and think that if you start going down the path of protectionism it wont end well as we import a lot more than we export.

cadbury had announced that they were going to cut jobs but kraft said they would keep the plant (they probably said "endevour" or some pish) and then reversed the decision after the takeover so really there was no change to the outcome.

and **** driving a rover

 

I take your points about the free market & the EU etc. As I said I wasn;t sure of the legality of it - just thinking out loud really.

Girvan - British products at the moment are more costly then cheap foreign imports but if the companies were able to be assisted by the government the prices could drop. The money we'd spend on benefits & retraining folk in the many areas that are affected by the loss of industry could be used to bring down the price of the products. It would cost the government the same on the face of it but more folk would be in full time pay - paying more in taxes & having more disposable income to put money in to the other industries via buying the products - rather than a guy on the dole who pays little tax & spends nothing on new products.

 

markets change, you change with it girvan

i'd rather we restructure what/how this country produces than have a lower standard of living. heavy industry for example, countries like poland can produce up to date modern vessels for a fraction of the price that we can because they have a cheap, skilled workforce, we could compete with this but would need a massive readjustment in pay if we wanted to. as for steel there is still a market for some of the high grade specialist steels that we can produce however china can undercut us so heavily on standard metals so much its ridiculous for us to compete.

we do however have a higher general standard of education so we can provide services and develope technology but the days of us minig/building trains/ships etc are over. we dont produce enough to be protectionist (this was barely feasable when we had an empire) so you either favour on industry over another which will more than likely strangle more areas of growth than it will allow protected sectors to flourish or you let free markets rule (as makes sense in a world with the communications links we have) and adapt

 

Some good points LR - re protecting certain industries, well the government have only really stepped in to try & assist the car industry over the years. I know they are classed as a skilled workforce compared to making chocolate bars but there have been several other industries & big companies fall foul of recent financial constraints yet nothing has been done to bail out anybody bar the car industry.

 

it murders exports though as competitors (china for instance) say you are not allowing free trade by subsidising them and would then most probably place heavy duties on UK products coming into china (most countries would do this) therefore only making your product viable in the uk. the other thing is that once this starts it spreads, i.e. well if you subsidise that i'll subsidise mine and place import duties on x, y and z from your bit etc etc

 

I'm all for the nationalisation of not just companies but whole industries, lets get back to the days when uk industry took on a major role in the well being of people in this country and not just profit. We could them provide people with not just jobs but life long careers and become world leaders. The first thing I would do is bring the drug industry under the control of the NHS.

 

you can offer good business rates, incentives etc but once you get into protectionsim (i.e. our x is £3 more expensive than their x so we'll give uk company x £3.10 for every one they make) you get into the free market thing. the US are currently trying to protect their aircraft industry and it looks like the EU and china are going to try and **** them over for it

 

thomas- nationalisation generally breeds waste and inefficiency and i dont really want to pay the taxes neccesary to buy back and then actually run these sectors

girvan- do agree that consumer choice in this country is dictated to us by the big 4 and is something that needs to be countered by gov, as they often have supplies (in and out of the uk) over a barrel.

as for the EU creating a bias against uk products do you mean specifically towards food? tbh i'd think that was a natural result of bse and foot and mouth, it was generally reported as "british mad cow disease" wasnt it. i even remember oprah talking about not eating british beef it was an understandable worry though, anyonre remember turkey mince? no one would've been eating that if we hadnt been worried about going bonkers from burgers

 

One of the best things to happen to the food industry/farming is the appeal for Organic foods.

Most of the meat I get is from the butchers, the fruit from the greengrocers & veg we have delivered direct from a farm. thats how it was for me growing up too...........well bar the delivery from the farm!!!

Now ****s are too lazy & would rather hit one shop & get the lot no matter how **** the processed meat is or how small the apples seem to be.

Afew years back we had one little green grocers, now that has taken over the shop next door & doubled in size & another one has opened further down the road.

 

i'm not too fussed about a 3rd of the planet starving to death as long as i can get a pair of powder blue with banana yellow striped addidas for under £50

 

There is already a dairy shortage because the French (quite rightly) are demanding a minimum payment for it. if they don't get it, they are pouring milk down the drain.
You will probably notice an increase in butter, cheese etc prices over the next few months.

 

we havent been able to support ourselves for a least a 100 years, we were nearly starved into submission in WW1

 

The only thing of note exported from the UK has been the Flu. Everything else we have has been imported...including Swine flu - the UK don;t even own the monopoly on Flu now ffs!!!

 

What a capitalist statement that is LR, waste in inefficiency in profit perhaps but the investment in people will create a happier and healthier population and prevent the creation of a disadvantaged and disruptive underclass isolated from the main population both in terms of potential income and influence.

 

More should be done to protect the long term future of industries though.

At the moment the supermarkets dictate alot of it. Things like Spuds, apples etc have to be a certain size & shape or the supermarket doesn;t want them. That means the farmer has to do more quality control to ensure the supermarkets are happy with his product. You can;t blame a farmer who has a deal with Tesco for his veg to comply with this as his & his families future is as stake.

The supermarket in turn blame the consumer for wanting the perfect size & shaped veg!!! I've never looked at piece of veg & thought WTF I'm not eating that as its not a perfectly round shape

How much of the excess veg that is not wanted by the supermarkets is just chucked away?? A fair bit according to the program i watched on it But the farmer incorperates that in to his costing & so does the supermarket hence the massive rise in the cost of a ****ing bag of spuds!!! So we're paying more to have round spuds???? I'd rather pay less to have any old shape, ffs it weighs the same, has the amount of spud!

 

**** poor people

i'm off to throw out some perfectly good food.

 

I watched that show too, on C4 I think. Great insight in to the rising costs in our supermarkets

 

it wont get chucked away it'll just get graded and he'll get a lower pirce for then, the'll end up in pasties and ready meals stuff like that along with all the bleeched chicken thighs

 

FFS brum should have guessed this was all about tatties. Spuds, you've been in engerlundshire too long.