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David Wilson
The late show
When the banks hit hard times, members of all the parliamentary parties decided that the recovery of the nation would be better left in the hands of the folks in the manufacturing industries.
So they put on an extensive show of support, taking any opportunity to convince large numbers of the public how important investment in such companies would be to create a new prosperity within their country.
Most folks who still worked in manufacturing were well aware, however, that a lot of the more traditional industries had long since headed for pastures anew, and they were frankly rather bemused at the late show of support from the parliamentarians.
But with the banks going deeper into debt, the politicians kept pounding home their message of hope ever louder as the day of the election approached. They realised that getting people back into work in manufacturing after the bank-led recession would clearly be one obvious vote-winning strategy.
However, despite their new-found enthusiasm for all things manufacturing, the politicians did recognise that many overseas manufacturers had an enormous advantage over their European counterparts - mostly because they paid their workforce a lot less.
So in their infinite wisdom, they decided to create substantial financial assistance programmes that would enable the manufacturers to automate their production environments, a process that they believed would enable the industries to compete with those wily folks from India and China.
A few companies did accept the government grants and tried to rejuvenate their manufacturing lines. But there were many that did not. The ones that didn’t realised that even with the most sophisticated automation equipment installed in their facilities, the price they would need to pay to maintain it would still outweigh the cost of farming the work out to low-paid manual workers overseas.
When the people’s representatives realised what was going on, they were forced to put a new spin on their industrialisation strategy.
So, in the run-up to the election, they asked the electorate to imagine a world in the near future in which, through their diligence and hard work, the workers in the overseas counties had finally achieved a standard of living that was comparable to their own, earning, and spending, comparable amounts of money.
Once that happened, the politicians argued, all the global manufacturing industries would again be on a level playing field and the role of European manufacturers would become vital to supply those new wealthy nations with technology and expertise, as well as high-end products that they did not manufacture themselves.
Unfortunately, once again, their arguments were flawed.
Because not only did it take 20 years for the folks in those nascent industrial nations to achieve a standard of living equal to their European counterparts, when they finally did, the companies there had built up enough expertise to design and manufacture the very same high-end products that the European parliamentarians had once claimed would be the salvation of their economies.
Dave Wilson
Editor, Engineeringtalk
Dave’s comments form part of the weekly Engineeringtalk newsletter, which also includes a round-up of the latest engineering products and services. To subscribe click here
Readers' comments (8)
Cathy Bettoney | 4 Mar 2010 1:36 pm
I've read that in India, there are more kids in honours courses than the US has kids.
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Terry Norton | 4 Mar 2010 2:02 pm
I agree with the above comments as I frequently deal with Far Eastern companies and have seen Taiwan lose ground on low-cost products and move up to high-end products and processes with high government support using profits from high past earnings. We squander our resources in this country on flim-flam attention to celebrity and ignore the opportunities to create wealth from producing products we can export. Instead, we spend an inordinate amount of money on bigger and better houses, which are made from mainly imported material and components. We should benchmark by comparison to other European manufacturers i.e. cars made by indigenous labour and supporting infrastructure. All we do is act as employees of the Japanese with screwdriver assembly aided by government
grants to get voter attention to the illusion they are creating employment, ignoring the real wealth that accrues to the Japanese. This will continue as long as we neglect
a long-term strategy for growth of our manufacturing sector. We have the skills to invent but not to manage as the best people earn more in the service sector, which acts like a casino in financial services but adds little value in means of productive effort. Unions have also destroyed the flexibility of labour i.e. British Leyland, British Airways, the Post Office.
The government has destroyed currency values increasing cost of materials. We are all in a total mess caused through neglect of the consequences of greed and laziness as evidenced in the public sector, which now employs 25 per cent of the workforce. Communism by the back door. Here endeth the rant.
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ian naismith | 4 Mar 2010 2:27 pm
Never a truer word written, Dave, you should be minister of trade Go for it. Regards, Ian.
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Anonymous | 4 Mar 2010 3:08 pm
It is difficult to envisage a level playing field while we are saddled with EU bigotry and interference together with over-zealous 'health and safety' regulations.
Bet your bottom dollar that India and China will not be adopting such lunacy.
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Cliff Johnston | 4 Mar 2010 4:12 pm
So true and well put. It is sad that our elected representatives do not undestand the simplest concepts. The time to object and to do something was before the industries have disappeared. Politicians think the people are stupid but in real terms it is the politicians who are stupid.
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Geoff Williams | 5 Mar 2010 11:07 am
How can British manufacturing survive when the cost of employing staff, implementing nonsensical health and safety regulations, paying unfair business rates is so high?
Coupled with the fact that the government saved a couple of lame duck banks only to see them laugh at the governments idea of supporting British manufacturing.
We must realise that the only way forward is to get back to basics by closing our doors to foreign government, labour and imports that compete with our industry.
Stop paying people to sit at home. Stop handing benefits to people who have not contributed - I could go on and on!
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Venkatesh | 6 Mar 2010 5:30 am
When I was in the USA last, I saw the shelves in supermarts filled with 'made in China' products, which were selling for a song as per US values. No wonder all manufacturing, engineering or otherwise, is leaving the country due to cost considerations. I do not know how it is in the UK, but may be similar.
I am from India and can definitely say that we do not make low-cost products, rather we make good-quality products at competitive prices. Our prices are on par with most European sources with similar quality.
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Steve Scott | 7 Mar 2010 7:46 pm
Well said, you are not just talking about the UK here, David. The same scenario is very true here in New Zealand. The only thing we are successfully exporting from our 'ex'-manufacturing sector these days are our very tallented people! Keep up the good work. Steve
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