Unpicking Bombardier's job losses

Chris lancashire

I wish it was as simple as the cost of gas and electricity - which are indeed well overtaxed and overpriced. I think it probably had more to do with the previous 30 years when British Rail underinvested in comparison to say SNCF or DB. So, whilst Derby was living on slim pickings (and consequently not making capital investments to become more efficient) Siemens et al were happily churning out new trainsets.
Fast forward to the last 5-10 years when, at last, privatised train companies were investing in new rolling stock and, unsurprisingly, Derby cannot compete on cost with its continental competitors.

It's a story of the last 30 years, not the last 12 or even 36 months.

London Calling

There are many ‘Wrongs’ and a one day strike of action compared to civil unrest and rioting on the streets to protest isn’t one of them. ..This is terrible news of more job losses and sadly all to frequent , but what makes this undercutting so painful is that it is a wrong made legally right by the EU Competition law. Added to this out of the 470,000 employed last year only 70,000 were UK born citizens, whilst Ian Duncan Smith spurts on about the workshy adding insult to injury for UK born citizens who struggle to find work whilst competing with a continuous influx of non UK citizens.

Wrong?…don’t even get me started….fairness is surely logical in these circumstances, I fear denial reigns happily, whilst listening and negotiation has neither the will or the power to act democratically…the silence is deafening...

mark

Devaluation to create growth doesn't work. Never has for a high income, non commodi producing economy and never will. We have the belting to living standards from high inflation, but the factories still keep closing.....

The Oncoming Storm

The thing that gets me about the EU angle is not so much that EU competition law exists, it is potentially a good thing, but it's the way that other member states just pay lip service to it while the stupid Brits adhere to it meticulously! Do you think that a German or French rail contract would go to a foreign firm even if the offer was "too good to refuse?"

TomTom

Siemens has a long and glorious history of running Slush Funds. It had a $2 billion fine in the US alone. The Slush Fund had about 1.3 billion Euros and no doubt Greece has a good idea how much the State Telecoms business raked off.

It isn't just Bombardier jobs you should worry about, it is Siemens' facility with kickbacks

CLK

There is a different dimension to this - quite literally. British railways are built to a different (smaller) size than on the Continent. Tunnel and station clearances for example are less. Thus while UK rolling stock can be and indeed is made in Continental plants and brought through the channel tunnel, the UK is only capable of producing for the home market as any rolling stock for Continental operators could not be delivered by rail through the tunnel. Road delivery is simply not feasible. Inevitably, as the manufacturers look to consolidate operations, the less flexible British plants will lose out. Sad but true.

William

Do the German railways run trains built outside Germany? Do the French railways run trains built outside France?

The only mugs playing by the EU rules, as usual, is the UK.

Siemens are past masters at winning contracts and then charging for 'extras' not included in the original contract. For example, they're involved in the Edinburgh trams fiasco that has seen the original budget doubled.

So it's nothing to do with any snivelling waffle about taxes on energy consumption. It's simply that we play fair and other countries don't.

daniel maris

It calls into question the alleged benefits of free trade and the EU in particular. Those are huge job losses.

For me it underlines that we need to get our independent energy infrastructure in place so that we can have cheap energy in future. It will require some sacrifice, but it will pay huge dividends in the future.

The era of free trade is over. The sooner our political elite understand that, the better. Cheating China is going to kill it off completely, because in the end we won't commit economic suicide.

The era of creative autarky is beckoning I believe, thanks to a range of technological developmnents which make domestication of the total economy feasible. We can produce our own energy, our own oranges and bananas, our own trains...In age where employment and inflation are becoming the key issues, why indulge in free trade which sends jobs overseas and puts you at the mercy of external inflationary pressure.

Fergus Pickering

We are all assuming the hte British stuff i as good as the Kraut stuff and the Nip stuff. Is it?

Liz Brown

When will the Government realise that it's uncompetitive carbon policy is a disaster for Britain and industry. This craven kowtowing to the fraudulent AGW lobby has to stop. So too, has the implementation ( with bells on) to directives from the EUSSR - whose acceptance of carbon reduction is acknowledged but not implemented - they know a heap of crock when they see it

FF

The purpose of running a competition is to find the best product at the best price. As far as I know Siemens offered this and Bombardier didn't.

Bombardier seems to be struggling against Siemens in general, which suggests their product isn't as good. Even if the Government deliberately favoured the inferior or more expensive product for industrial policy reasons, that may not be enough to save Bombardier and the jobs of the people it employs in Derby. Unfortunately.

David Lindsay

Ah, the strange matter of the EU and Britain's railways.

We allegedly cannot take them back into public ownership because of the EU, too. Apparently, the tracks and the trains cannot be owned by the same people. Yet, funnily enough, in most and possibly all other member-states, the tracks and the trains are indeed owned by the same people, usually, if not always, The People.

And no, they do not buy their stock from abroad. Nor, for example, do the French Army, Navy and Air Force - each the third-largest in the world - procure from abroad. And nor is any other member-state aware of some sort of ban on state aid except to banks.

It will not wash to say that we are the only people who ever play by the rules. Could it be that those are not in fact the rules at all?

Yow Min Lye

When was the last time anyone saw a German police patrol cruising the autobahns in a Jaguar? Or Parisian commuters strap-hanging on a bus built in Leeds or Blackburn?

Unfortunately, the much-hailed 'Single Market' has proved to be like so many other facets of the European Union: a one-way street whereby Britain naively plays by the rules whilst other member states brazenly look after their own national interests.

TrevorsDen

As I understand it France and Germany break the EU rules on things like train manufacture by wording their contracts accordingly. i understand today that the UK govt will be doing the same - if our quisling civil servants let them.
I understand that these contracts were let by the labour govt and were specifically written so they could not be cancelled.

Dennis Churchill

TrevorsDen
July 5th, 2011 7:01pm
“I understand that these contracts were let by the labour govt and were specifically written so they could not be cancelled.”

That must have cost a lot of Kick-Back Euros.

alexsandr

both companies have had problems delivering trains.
siemens ones are seriously overweight. They reckon the trains on the winderemere branch are wearing the track out with their weight.
anyway our trains now are too all singing/dancing and seriously too expensive.

dorothy wilson

I remember attending a meeting in Germany during the 1990s at which a leader of one of their key industrial sectors actually said: "We are not like the English. We do not believe in free trade. We believe in protecting our markets."

He may have been speaking for himself. He may have been speaking for his own particular sector but ......

daniel maris

Continental Europe has never been committed to free trade in the same way as the UK.

Our elite saw free trade as a way of enriching themselves, and making the country prosperous more generally - so securing the UK as "top nation".

For the best part of two centuries they were probably right.

No longer. Cheating China - home to the biggest counterfeiting operations and wilful defiance of WTO regulations - will not stop until it has gobbled up half of Europe's economy.

Meantime, we are finding it difficult to compete with countries like Germany, committed to a modern agenda of co-operative working and green energy.

A free trade policy is untenable.

Fergus Pickering

Did we not use to buy (perhaps we still do) expensive British stuff for our armed forces rather than cheap American stuff which was better anyway. Do we approve of this policy? My car is Korean. My previous cars were French, Swedish and German. I did once try to buy a Brit car but they wouldn't sell me one when I wanted it viz. the day I walked into the shop. My Korean car is lovely, the best car I have ever owned.

CLK

alexsandr - you are absolutely correct and they have fewer seats per carriage than the old stuff.

By way of some balance, I think that job creation by Bombardier Aerospace in Belfast is in the order of 2,000 jobs over the last 5 or 6 years. Its still a net gain to UK PC from one company and their sub-contractors.

Mr Oulton

An over-simplified explanation.

And to those who claim investment has only started since privatisation. Well in fact privatisation coincides with an absolutely enormous increase in government subsidy.

Privatisation also means that yes, commuters in Leeds travel on French-owned buses and train passengers in Buckinghamshire travel on German owned trains. It also means fares have skyrocketed whilst executive pay has too. But still, no one - least of all a right-winger - will question the virtues of privatisation.