Economic disaster

As you may have realised I am very proud of being British, I am proud of this countries history and heritage. This country has led the way in so many areas; whether that be in parliamentary democracy, new technology, music, science, our judicial system, etc. I think anyone who is British can feel very proud of what this small nation has achieved. One of the things that makes me sad is how this nation has declined as an industrial power. This country still produces many products, but unfortunately nowhere near as much as we used to.

Great Britain, as I have already said has led the way in so many different areas. Britain was called the 'workshop of the world' during the Victorian era, Britain forged ahead of its rivals in building; ships, trains, large industrial machines and many other products. In 1911 971,000 workers were employed in the coal mining industry alone, the majority of them men. Let me list some of the industries this country led the way in. In 1960 90 per cent of motor cycles were made in this country, with famous names like; BSA, Triumph and Norton, to name but a few. In the 1960's Britain was the second largest car manufacturer with names like; Triumph, Austin, MG, Morris, etc. In 1970 300,000 workers were employed in the steal industry. On top of this we built ships, we had coal mines, many heavy engineering works, an electronics industry and many other manufacturing companies. In a lot of ways not much had changed since the Victorian times.

In my life time I have watched as our economy has changed and I have to say not for the better. Our economy has changed and is now mostly dependent on the service sector and internal spending. About 80 per cent of our economy is reliant on people buying products, about 12.5 per cent of our economy is based around manufacturing, this really concerns me.

Many people will argue that it is impossible to reverse this decline, but I disagree. What concerns me is the rise of China as the most important industrial power in the world. Unlike the USA, China is not a democracy and does not really care about public opinion, and as its power grows it will abuse that power (this is a subject in itself, which I do not have the time to go into).

I believe we can reverse the decline in our manufacturing, and the way to do this is by encouraging all business with a reduction in red tape, and taxes. Triumph motor cycles is a good example of a British manufacturer producing good products that people want. Triumph is based in Hinkley in Leicestershire, it has gone from nothing to being the 2nd largest motorcycling manufacturer in Europe in less than 20 years. This is a true British success story, I believe if we work alongside companies like Triumph and use them as an example we can once again see Britain's manufacturing grow. Alongside this we need to invest in science and engineering, we need to encourage those who have an interest in these subjects to go onto university, and than give tax breaks to companies who employ apprentices. We need to encourage companies to invest in Britain by deregulating, that is why London has become the largest financial centre in the world. At the end of the day business wants to make money, and they want to employ the right people who can do this for them.

One of the ways we could encourage British manufacturing is to bring in a law that requires all public sector bodies to buy at least 25 per cent of their goods from British companies. This of course would rely on whether there was the company out there that made the required product and the quality of the product. I work for the fire service and there are many British manufacturers who make quality products for this industry. I think the Government should force all fire services to buy British products, I believe this could be beneficial for British jobs and cheaper as well. Let me give you an example; there are 3 different helmet manufacturers selling helmets to the fire service in this country, these are; Rosenbaur, Gallett and Cromwell, as you can imagine Cromwell is the British company. The Government could say to all fire services you have to buy Cromwell; all of the fire services could then go to Cromwell and say we want a certain type of helmet and because we are going to buy literally 1000's of helmets, can you give us a good price? I am sure Cromwell would fall over themselves to deliver whatever was wanted.

One of the things that concerns me about our economy, is that it has almost become 'a one trick pony'. It is like the saying, 'do not put all your eggs in one basket', Britain's economy is so reliant upon the financial sector. With added regulation coming from the EU we could see many financial companies leaving this country, and this would be a disaster. We need to look at how we can encourage business to grow, not keep hammering them with more and more taxes and red tape. We need to encourage small companies to employ people and give them tax breaks for doing so. I was talking to a friend of mine who runs his small electronics business, he is a one man band and employs no one. He was telling me he has too much work and would love to employ someone, but it is not worth his while doing so, it would cost him too much money. The problem is if you employ someone, you have to pay higher insurance, holiday pay, sick pay, national insurance, etc, I am not saying companies shouldn't pay these things, but we should at least give companies tax breaks to help them.

We in this country have been used to a very high standard of living, we have to be realistic and understand that if we do not encourage business to grow, our economy will continue to slide and our standard of living will ultimately drop. I believe if there isn't a change in how our economy is run we will continue to see our manufacturing disappear, and if a country does not make anything it will be totally reliant on others and this will eventually lead to disaster.