We're one stop away from EUSSR if we're NOT there already -EUROPEAN DEBATE REVIEW

Like many millions of people globally I was transfixed to my Sky Channel 501 for the #LBCdebate between Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage this week. Like many too I was appalled at the way Sky News chaired and massaged their intended result in the build up and subsequently their extraordinary aspersion that Clegg won the debate BEFORE the polls came in. Like many '000s I tweeted during the debate my views and responses and I reckon by the half-time hurdle Farage had trounced & trumped Clegg completely. Like an enthralling FA Cup Final when the underdog outplays the clear favourite the whole 89 minutes it was conclusive at that stage that the only way Farage could lose momentum and the debate would be if he lost his rag with that apparatchik Deputy PM or make an extraordinary howler as many predicted in the media before the final whistle. He didn't as any sane and intelligent person who has ever seen a debate knows full well. Ferrari of LBC did a pretty good job but I'm sure I wasn't the only person watching who found many of the audiences questions quite lame. A proper debate on these important issues could and should have been put together in advance allowing coherent responses from each of the opposing candidates and ONLY then questions thrown to the audience. Anyway this is a moot point but Farage surprised many in the way he handled himself. When I say many I'm of course referring to those who are not accustomed or aware that the art and technique of debating is part and parcel of the Public School educational system that so many on the left of our politics & media consistently and constantly criticise. As we all saw, it was a clean battle between Dulwich College and their central London neighbours, Westminster School. The Old Alleynians should be proud of their man.

Peter Oborne, the distinguished journalist made reference to the BBC Sky bias in his article so I'm not going to dwell on this further suffice to say that there were 2 important areas within the debate which neither candidate appeared to grasp fully. I should declare my hand as a Member of UKIP here and I suppose then what I'm about to say may be construed as a criticism of Farage's UKIP researchers and speech/debate preparers (whatever they are called these days) but I'm going to comment anyway.

The first point concerns the moment when Ferrari mentioned the Siemens jobs in Hull. What nobody appeared to grasp was the relevance of the question and I'm not sure even Ferrari knew the dynamics here if Farage had been properly coached and given the correct research beforehand (well it was a blind question but this scenario is at the heart of UKIP's argument). Anyway let me refresh for those not old enough to remember.

In 1886 the following event occurred; the UK General Electric Company was created.

GEC traces its origins to G. Binswanger and Company, an electrical goods wholesaler established in London in the 1880s by a German Jewish immigrant Gustav Binswanger (later Gustav Byng).Regarded as the year GEC was founded, 1886 saw a fellow immigrant, Hugo Hirst, join Byng, and the company changed its name to The General Electric Apparatus Company (G. Binswanger).

During the 1980's when Margaret Thatcher was in power Wikipedia record the following;

In April 1981 GEC acquired Cincinnati Electronics (CE),.... CE was a leader in military Radios and Infrared Technology, Space Electronics and other high security products, doing business throughout the world. GEC acquired more U.S. companies Mitel and Picker Corporation, an American manufacturer of medical imaging equipment. It merged Picker with Cambridge Instruments, GEC Medical, and American Optical to form Picker International. GEC Medical was itself an amalgamation of Watson & Sons Ltd - formed in the early 20th Century in London and long a part of GEC, and A E Dean & Co of Croydon. In 1982, it introduced the first 1.0T Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) unit. In 1998, it acquired the CT division of Elscint Ltd. In 1999 the company changed its name to Marconi Medical Systems. In 2001 Philips Electronics bought Marconi Medical Systems for $1.1 billion. GEC had become Britain's largest and most successful company and private employer, with about ¼M employees in 1983. In 1984 GEC became one of the first 100 companies to enter the FTSE 100 Index, at which time it was ranked third behind British Petroleum and Shell Transport and Trading with a market capitalisation of £4.915 billion and a cash reserve of £5 billion. In 1985 it acquired Yarrow shipbuilders from British Shipbuilders.

In 1988 GEC merged with Plessey Telecommunications.

In 1989 GEC and Siemens formed a joint company, GEC Siemens plc, to take over the Plessey Company. GEC acquired the defence electronics division of Ferranti in 1990 and Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd. (VSEL) in 1995.

Lord Weinstock retired as Managing Director in 1996.

After the failure of most of its U.S. acquisitions, GEC began on the road to contraction until its ultimate demise. The cash mountain of £5 billion which Lord Weinstock had built up in the 1980s had all but disappeared through bad management.

The following has just been taken off a quick google search;-

GEC PLESSEY TELECOMMUNICATIONS TO REDUCE WORKFORCE by CBR Staff Writer| 09 May 1988

GEC Plessey Telecommunications has left the City wondering what was the point of the merger after announcing that System X manufacture will continue at both the highly-automated Plessey plant in Liverpool and at the GEC plant in Coventry, being phased out only at the GEC plant in Kirkcaldy: the group wants to reduce its 23,000-strong workforce by a less-than-expected 1,800 by the end of this year; the Financial Times reckons these will be spread among the three plants mentioned, and also at Plessey's Beeston PABX plant, and at the telephone handset manufacturing plant in Aycliffe, County Durham.

 

So by now anyone reading this may have deduced that GEC who employed about 250,000 UK people in 1983, faltered and had a large chunk of its operations absorbed into the gigantic Siemens universe after the failure of the GEC Siemens joint venture in 1988-1989. What should really have been discussed surely then is how many people do Siemens employ today in UK (??). If the wind turbine announcement in Hull is anything to go by it looks as if Siemens today employ a lot less than  the MMC envisaged in 1988 when the acquisition of Plessey was examined. This is NOT a great argument for job creation in UK by EU businesses who don't have a great track record on employment beyond a relatively short timeframe.

 

Now moving to my second point which wasn't discussed properly during the #LBCdebate but was hinted at several times. Again this relates to jobs but actually is more to do with protectionism, which perhaps is the elephant in the room which the pro-EU lobby, Sky News et al and most of Fluff Street always fail to examine properly. I have blogged about this in the past but here goes.

 

Can you name as many EU companies in 1 minute that are operating freely in UK, sometimes have bought FTSE100/250/350 companies?

 

EDF (various UK utilities)

TotalGaz

Santander

Siemens

how many European banks?

......stop there

 

Can you name any UK companies that have managed to acquire EU companies listed on the major exchanges across Europe?

 

.....not many....but I do recollect Wiggins Teape Appleton merging with Arjo becoming Arjo Wiggins some years back and of course there was that failed RBS acquisition of ABN AMRO.

 

So in truth the UK is adopting an OPEN DOOR policy for businesses and migrants whereas Europe speaks about this but doesn't execute its game plan.

 

Is it any wonder that UKIP now has 23% support in UK and the number is growing?

 

 

 

 

"There's Gold in Them Thar Hills"
---Nigel Beynon EDITOR-IN-CHIEF City-Watch.net

 

MARKETS: Equity markets in the UK and US are pretty quiet so far this year, but more new issues are planned. Firms like Poundland are coming to the market. Silver and Gold are both up quite a bit, but Copper and Oil are down. This suggests that economies are still weak, which may explain why central banks, such as the Bank of England, are trying to keep interest rates low.

 

STOCKS: In 1848 the first California Gold Rush started in Sutter's Creek. About 100 miles away a new one is happening in Mountain View, just outside San Francisco. This is part of the world famous 'Silicon Valley'; home to firms like Google. Some of these companies have awesome financial power, such as Facebook, which is buying another Valley firm WhatsApp for $19bn. WhatsApp has 450 million active users and was founded as recently as 2009. That's a very productive 5 years work! The founders previously worked for Yahoo - another valley firm. So the old-timer's advice no longer applies; the Gold's no longer in the hills ... it"s in the Valley.