I bet they knew that Honda don't have a presence in Sunderland though

You still haven't got it have you?

The problems start and stop with the management, the same workers have proved they can work well and produce good quality cars, on time, on budget and they just work. The union doesn't rock the boat because they have no need to, management see the unions as a tool for good not something to antagonise, likewise when the workers raise issues they are listened to, treated with respect and agreements are made.

Would you ever see UK management work like Honda did last year, paid downtime with agreements to work if off when the parts supply returns to normal?

BTW, Honda are in Swindon, Nissan in Sunderland.

That's what flexible labour is all about!! matching supply and demand we have that in our factory in Bradford the guys paid the same each month the work longer hours Aug to Dec shorter hours April to July - seasonal demand cycle. We also allow them to carry days owed to the company into the following year. We don't have a union but we got 90% approval on introduction and has been running happily for over two years. We tried to introduce this arrangement into other sites but we got short shrift from Unite. Guess what happened - the company simply closed the sites which resulted in 500+ people losing their jobs.

To say it is always the management's fault shows you have little/no dealings with the likes of Unite.

Here is another example you can google. BGP a large printing firm losing money, they decided they need to reduce labour costs by 10-20% so they proposed a sliding scale 20% for Management down to 10% for those on 18k+ and none for those below. Unite had a very small representation 13% but thought it had some negotiating status. BGP said Unite had no rights and just went straight to staff and got the plan agreed - it was either agree or close. Unite - being excluded took umbridge and threatened to legally challenge there own members vote!!

So you have to question does the union work for its members or is it only interested in itself?

Or, you could question anyone two-dimensional enough to think you can boil a complex institution of myriad conflicting viewpoints, ideologies, motivations etc. to a precipitate whose absolute nature can be unambiguously determined with a simple "yes" or "no" answer.

You ask Honda to take slightly lower profits so it isnt so inflexible towards it works and see what type of reasonable answer you get.

Increased cost would be great if Honda operated in isolation - they don't though do they? Reduced profitability would mean reduced R&D would ultimately lead to reduced competitive advantage etc.

In the real world they do.

Also in the real world the term "profits" means something different. It means R&D spending in the real world.

If our unions and our labour force are so inflexible, why did Nissan, Toyota and Honda set up here instead of other EU countries and why have BMW and Land Rover Jaguar announced extending the range of British-built models?

FWIW Toyota,Honda,Kia & Hyundai and maybe other non french car manufacturers all have factories in France

Nissan opted for a factory in Portugal rather than France which was a major shock to the french government at the time

Im fairly sure what is spend on R&D is counted as a cost, and as such it itself reduces profits.

R&D doesn't come out of profits. It's a cost just like any other cost and is accounted for before profits are calculated.

Don't talk soft, anyone knows that in the real world what happens is, they look in the petty cash tin and if there's anything left after the tea & biscuits have been bought, they spend that on R&D

Print Union. Blimey. I didn't realise they were still around. I used to be in the NGA many years ago, mostly because as there were so many "closed shops" you had to be in it just to get a job. Thinking back, that sounds rather "selective" and "elitist" doesn't it.

Imagine these days being told you wouldn't even be considered for a job as you didn't have the right papers. "sorry mate, you'd be perfect, but I can't even talk to you because you haven't paid someone the subs"

... or hadn't been to the 'right school' etc ...

Like say, a doctor?

'Jobs for the boys' is nothing new, and happens at all levels of society. Someone gets a job because they happen to have 'connections'.

It is just that, when the benefactor happens to be the offspring of someone who has a few £££, the rest of us find it so much more unpaletable.

So a closed shop is OK if you have money and connections but not if you're working class?

Another one who cannot read - Where did I say R&D comes out of profits? infact depending on the type of R&D some of it can hit the income statement.

Companies need profits to fund R&D and you can be sure as soon as profits drop off two things happen - capital spend will be curtailed - which if you believe Maynard Keynes is required to start the upward cycle and is a good indicator of the start of the downward cycle - and R&D spend will be reduced.

And another one - but then if you spend all day talking to fish what should we expect? but you know how to avoid having to use your car's breaks unecessarily - that's the real world you live in!!

Erm - how about here:


If you don't mean stuff then stop posting it.

Oh god – you're not really going to start invoking "the real world" again, are you?

Which reminds me: a week or so ago you were crying about how your nasty boss didn't care about you, refusing you a pay rise after you'd asked (presumably with appropriate forelock tugging at the time).

Now, given your dedication to matters of fiscal prudence in "the real world", it seems safe to assume that you didn't ask for a rise that your employer could not have afforded. So in other words, you have been made to take a pay cut – because that's what your employer can do.

Which makes all your rants about trades unions look increasingly like the politics of envy – envy that other people don't simply give in and do nothing except whinge and whine on the internet. How very dare they, eh?

Or, [url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/apr/15/firms-told-to-spend-cash-to-boost-economyas referenced here[/url they simply sit on their £750bn war chest and twiddle thier thumbs, waiting for an upturn

How many more times do I have to tell you: my car gets plenty of breaks, far more than I do in fact. I'm very good to my car in that respect, I give it plenty of breaks and it takes me where I want to go. A perfect symbiosis.

As the evidence over the last decade shows, investment will be in emerging markets. UK based multinationals use funds generated here and elsewhere primarily to fund expansion in developing economies. Until such time as the UK represents a better investment opportunity than some low-cost economy with a large, young population with growing affluence then the investment in jobs, factories, etc from the major companies just won't happen here to a sufficient level to drive the UK economy forward.

so to conclude, both the public school boys and the working classes have ways of protecting their interests. I was in the latter.


Mintball, you must have been in the National Union of Journalists? How did they help you if you were?