From The GWPF, newsbytes on the subject of UK Businesses Threaten To Flee Abroad To Escape Green Energy Levies
British industry’s ability to compete with companies overseas is under threat from punitive green energy costs, the new president of the CBI has told The Sunday Telegraph. Sir Roger Carr warns in an interview that the Coalition must give “some sort of support” over rising energy costs to UK manufacturers or else risk seeing businesses relocate abroad with the consequential loss of jobs. His comments – ahead of a CBI energy conference on Tuesday – come amid growing concern over the cost of renewable energy subsidies and so-called ‘green stealth taxes’. —The Sunday Telegraph, 12 June 2011
The CBI and Britain’s leading chemical firms have warned that the proposed UK “carbon floor” tax (unique in the world) will make our industry so uncompetitive that, unless the policy is changed, it will lead inevitably to mass plant closures and job losses. Similarly, the European Metals Association warned last week that the EU’s various “anti-carbon” policies are becoming so costly that they are already forcing steel, aluminium and other producers in their energy-intensive industry to relocate outside Europe, losing hundreds of thousands more jobs. Sooner or later, politicians must emerge with the sense and the courage to question this madness – as many other people are now beginning to do. But there is little sign of their emergence yet. —Christopher Booker, The Sunday Telegraph, 12 June 2011
The Coalition’s obsession with climate change is damaging Britain’s recovery from recession, former Tory chancellor Nigel Lawson warns today. Writing in the Daily Mail, Lord Lawson delivers a scathing assessment of David Cameron’s so-called ‘green agenda’ and says it is ‘time this Government grew up’. Lord Lawson, one of the most respected Tory figures of recent decades, accuses the Prime Minister of risking Britain’s economy to make a ‘symbolic’ point. In a devastating verdict he writes: ‘The Government’s highly damaging decarbonisation policy, enshrined in the absurd Climate Change Act, does not have a leg to stand on. It is intended, at massive cost, to be symbolic: To make good David Cameron’s ambition to make his administration “the greenest government ever”. —Nigel Lawson, Daily Mail, 11 June 2011
It is time for Britain to walk away from its ridiculously stringent renewable energy plan.
This whole story is an instructive and depressing example of what happens when consensus rules. “The science is settled” was the line, and our politicians, few of them any more scientific than you or I, fell in with it. It was once famously said that, for evil to prosper, it is necessary only for good people to do nothing. But the peculiar hypocrisy of modern culture is such that it is when our leaders rush around trying most self-consciously to do good that the real damage is done. —Charles Moore, The Daily Telegraph, 11 June 2011
“It is intended, at massive cost, to be symbolic: To make good David Cameron’s ambition to make his administration “the greenest government ever”.
As an added bonus it makes Cameron’s father-in-law and wind-subsidy reaper a lot of money.
Wouldn’t any thinking person question why this is a suprise?
another titanic sinking and of there own making and the sad think is they will never recover
The destruction of UK industry is the main objective of the carbon tax.
Corrupt communitarian crooks.
To be honest this is little to do with green taxes. This is an old chestnut where banks and businesses threaten to flee abroad every time they hear something they don’t like. Usually it’s because of a tax on their obscene bonuses after losing our investments, or being asked to help sort out the mess they made in some other way. In the event very very few of them go, It seems they feel places like China may not treat them so kindly if they mess up when based in such authoritarian regimes. Some of the very few that did, slink back after a year or two with their tails between their legs.
The UK parliament, the “most brightly lit talking shop in Europe” is still convinced that the entire UK economy can be supported by money juggling. It’s about time the MP’s woke up to the fact that the developing world, where the wealth is being increasingly generated, will not be using the cream skimmers of the Wall St and London Stock Exchanges in the future. They will set up and use their own market trading apparatus, probably on linux systems.
As a trained engineer, I despair at the destruction wreaked by Margaret Thatcher (Aided and abetted by Nigel Lawson) on the UK industrial base, and the continuation of her mad economic policies by a series of watered down self-servative administrations since. A lot of my american friends hold Margaret Thatcher in high esteem. They didn’t live here and watch the way she wrecked our country.
Nigel Lawson realised late in the day the madness of Thatcher’s Global Warming spin used to destroy the unionised mining community (who had the best safety record in the world), and now speaks out against the policy he himself helped create as Thatcher’s chancellor in a belated act of contrition. I give him props for that, but haven’t forgotten the damage he helped do to my country.
The political arm of the Unions, the Labour party were no better, and take their share of the blame for the failure of British manufacturing business. Mismanagement and corruption are bringing Britain to its knees, and the population is too successfully distracted watching TV and buying cheap alcohol to notice.
/rant
“It was once famously said that, for evil to prosper, it is necessary only for good people to do nothing.”
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That’s a fine quote, however, I think it would be more appropriate to use this one…….”Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”………. Voltaire
They are committing atrocities on a daily basis in pursuit of this absurdity.
We have the same insanity under Governor Moonbeam (Brown – Calif). Althought, honestly, the Governator started it.
Who is John Galt?
The best quote from Lord Lawson’s article:
“My dictionary defines green as ‘unripe, immature, undeveloped’”
“tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am”
Well said that man. I too watched Thatcher wreak havock on industry in the UK. One element of her vision was to move from traditional industry to a services economy. Too few eggs in too few baskets, we all know how that turned out in 2008. And back in the 1980’s it was mighty difficult finding any work or any kind, but I did get lucky.
When business men can’t make a profit, they won’t bother making a business.
When people can get enough by not working, they won’t.
Maybe if we cut politicians pay by 50% we wouldn’t have these problems..
These guys say the same thing about tax every year but nobody leaves. Empty posturing.
““Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you’d have good people doing good things and evil people doing bad things, but for good people to do bad things, it takes religion.” ~ Steven Weinberg, Nobel Laureate in physics.”
I don’t think there is any doubt that AGW doctrine has well and truly reached religion status.
Interesting post Tallbloke. You can’t blame right wing people from other countries idolising Thatcher, as you say they never experienced first hand the damage she did to the UK industrial base. In fact she did more for a reduction in Carbon emissions than any other PM before or since. The left do the same, they idolise Mao, Lenin and Castro etc because they don’t have to live under their regimes. A prophet is never recognised in his own country, usually for the most sound of reasons.
tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am
With the increasing number of Muslims from foreign origins now living in Britain, along with the stealthy Muslimization of Britain, I can’t imagine many of your chaps drinking cheap alcohol.
I would say, let all of the unhappy British companies come here, but we have just as much of a dufus government as you do. So it really wouldn’t be better here. Canada, maybe?
Don’t worry England, ’cause PM Gillard of Austraya is running right alongside you, taking us down the crapper too!!!
Re: Gareth Phillips
There is a huge difference between adding a cost after profit (tax on profits/bonuses) and adding a cost before profits. In the former case the business has actually made a profit to be taxed so it is a viable business. In the later case the added production cost gets compounded throughout the production process and may well mean that your product can no longer compete in the market place. In other words you go bust or move.
Sir roger Carr, new chairman of the CBI, is also CEO of Certrica. This company’s former name was British Gas a major energy company. Do I see a conflict of interest?
Centrica is into renewables. Conflict of interest confirmed.
Gareth Phillips says: June 13, 2011 at 12:30 am
To be honest this is little to do with green taxes. This is an old chestnut where banks and businesses threaten to flee abroad every time they hear something they don’t like.
NO IT IS NOT Banks and the businesses you refer to are usually head office companies, with nothing much more invested in the UK than a rented building a few key staff (who are paid so well they’d move anywhere to keep the salary.
In contrast, the heavy intensive industry to which the CBI refer, are capital intensive, they have huge plant and machinery in the UK … BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT USES THE ENERGY … and they are run by pragmatic people who have got on with the job of running their business despite the harsh anti-industry environment spread by the like of Thatcher, Nu-labour and worst of all “all industry destroys our beloved world and should be anihilated from the UK” BBC.
These are companies that have sat quietly by as the rest of the UK talked them down, and got on with the job of making money, making exports. But now not only is the social environment in the UK anti-industry, but now the economic environment is so anti-industry that they have no choice by to contemplate the massively expensive exercise of moving their entire heavy industry manufacturing plant abroad … or perhaps more likely just winding down in the UK and steadily (continuing) to build up abroad, where politicians, the broadcasters and the public have the common sense to appreciate those who create a country’s wealth, rather than gambling on the stock markets.
Sir Roger Carr warns in an interview that the Coalition must give “some sort of support” over rising energy costs to UK manufacturers
tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am
The UK parliament, the “most brightly lit talking shop in Europe” is still convinced that the entire UK economy can be supported by money juggling.
So the “money juggling” will just mean that the “support” to UK manufacturers will be borne by the PBI’s; the Poor Bl***y Infantry: the ordinary wage earner/taxpayer, those in the dwindling number of jobs left to us, those already in fuel poverty, the “lions led by donkeys.”
Th British elite have, with few exceptions, always had utter contempt for anything useful – like the practical business of creating wealth.
They imagine, not that the rest of us owe them a living, but that we should keep them in opulence.
Well said tallbloke. Only to add that it’s high time we took back control of money from the bwankers and their coterie who create it out of debt.
tallbloke June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am
Your “rant” is spot on. Well said.
According to the chairman of Centrica, Ofgem are forecasting average UK energy bills to increase by £500 over the next decade to cover the costs of decarbonisation. This is of course in addition to the estimated £200 already paid.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/yourbusiness/8570043/CBI-president-Sir-Roger-Carrs-vision-for-a-competitive-UK-economy.html
The UK social democrat regime seems utterly determined to destroy whats left of British wealth creating industry, there can be no other explanation for the current madness. The regime is engaged in a reckless spending and borrowing policy throwing hundreds of billions of pounds away as fast as it possibly can and most if not all on things that have no social or material benefit to the taxpayers who have to fund this insanity. Criminal activities and social disorder are tolerated and the criminal classes if caught at all face such laughably short sentences and soft treatment the criminal class now thrives as never before. Never before has an elected government worked so assiduously to smash and destroy its own nation in such a short time.
Taxpayers money is not being invested it is simply being thrown away as fast as possible and most is going overseas to our direct and future competitors even as the regime borrows more money than it can ever hope to pay back. The only possible explanation is that the regime is determined to spend all the money and break the UK, lead it to fiscal and economic destruction and ruin. The question has to be asked, just who would benefit from the economic and fiscal collapse and consequent social upheaval? The political class have run wild, they will not listen to reason and they will not stop their destructive policies. The climate change act alone is capable of smashing our economy all on its own, its staggering costs bring no actual benefits to the UK at all. We are told that this madness will give us some kind of moral lead or moral superiority and that once we have shown the way other nations will surely follow, No they bloody wont! They will stand aside and laugh at us and then proceed to sift through the wreckage for salvage.
No reasonable or indeed sane government would gleefully and happily strangle and asset strip the wealth creating sector to finance the creation of an unsustainable wealth consuming sector, the imbalance is fast becoming untenable and unsustainable even in the short term. Entire areas of the UK now resemble wastelands, market towns once prosperous now seem like ghost towns, high streets are increasingly deserted and boarded up. More and more people now need the regimes charity just to make ends meet and those who cannot bring themselves to beg for aid are living close if not beyond the definition of poverty. One or two really cold winters is going to finish off an awful lot of the poor elderly. Leave your house to go the shops and you might come home to squatters who now have more rights to steal houses than the owners have rights to live in them.
I’d like to wave this under Julia Gillard’s nose in Australia and go “see – this is what lies ahead if you carry on with this stupid charade”
all this green jobs bollocks – we have plenty of empirical evidence now from the EU that it’s total nonsense – jobs flow to India and China and other places that don’t have such polices. Fact.
As an escapee from the socialist labour utopia of what was great britain I see Mrs Thatcher as the first and perhaps only pollitician to see through the global warming scam and admit it, and she closed down the hopeless mines and broke for a time the obscene union monopoly in many manufacturing industries, In later years, due to the lack of opposition that could form whole sentences, she became less able. The unions are a big part of this worldwide recession.
It’s all very well the CBI ranting about the punitive carbon taxes on British Industry, but at their conference, they will also politically correctly speak of the need to reduce our carbon dependence and promote renewable alternatives. “Green” energy companies are also members of the CBI and these will fight their corner in defence of the present structure, though there are not very many of these as the vast majority of our “green” energy plant and products come from abroad. A colleague from Denmark over in England this weekend paid particular thanks to me for the support given by the British government in boosting the value and income from his Vestas shares.
Until the CBI and major British companies, many of whose success actually rely on the availability and abundance of competitively priced electricity and fuel, gain the courage to speak out against the “consensus”, little will change. They are tying their hands behind their backs because at the same time, they still worship at the shrine to Global Warming. So nothing significant is going to happen until the CBI and British companies drop this pretence and begin to challenge not only our present political overreaction, but also the corrupt “science” at its heart.
Sadly, the UK is history which will probably be written in Cantonese: http://www.debtbombshell.com/
tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am
“…As a trained engineer, I despair at the destruction wreaked by Margaret Thatcher (Aided and abetted by Nigel Lawson) on the UK industrial base, and the continuation of her mad economic policies by a series of watered down self-servative administrations since. A lot of my american friends hold Margaret Thatcher in high esteem. They didn’t live here and watch the way she wrecked our country…”
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Just to correct the history, the UK went down the pan immediatedly following WW2 with the US insisting on the break up of the commonwealth and the UK paying huge sums to the US as the price for US support (shipping military hardware) during WW2, I believe that it is only in the last few years that the war debt to the US has been paid back!
Coupled with this, immediately following WW2, the British Work force ethic became more relaxed and then in the 60s and 70s there were crippling strikes in all major manufacturing inductry. In fact it was the strike actions in the 60s and 70s that led to the loss of industry and killed the work shop of the world. The motor bike industry was already goine long before Thatcher and the car industry was on its knees. So too with washing machines and sewing machines and the like and consumer electronics was lost to the Far East. The only industries of any note still remaining when she took office were coal and steel and both were in desperate straits. That is not to say that they should not have been saved in some form or other but it is wrong to blame Thatcher for the industrial down fall of the UK. Indeed, I recall recently hearing that more industry was lost during NU Labour’s term in office than during Thatcher’s governments.
Thatacher did of course (initially) jump on the Global Warming band wagon since she wanted to promote nuclear in place of coal. Unfortunately, she did not succeeed in rolling out nuclear (unlike France) and she later changed her mind about Global Warming no doubt because she was never a true believer and simmply alligned herself with it for short term political gain (to help destroy the coal industry/defeat the miner’s trade union which she thought was holding the country to randsom).
Tallbloke – all v. true – except the alcohol isn’t that cheap!
And Old Guy said, “Revolution be in the air me thinks me love. Grab some powder dear, we’re going to pay No.10 a visit tonight.”
There is something so incredibly stupid about the Upper Class, they never learn that they are not the people and do not speak for the people. A pox on their heads!
Do not blame Margaret Thatcher. The real blame lies with her advisor – Crispin Tickell.
Dave says:
June 13, 2011 at 4:24 am
Do not blame Margaret Thatcher. The real blame lies with her advisor – Crispin Tickell.
Don’t blame BP, it was their American sub-contractors.
Chris Edwards says:
June 13, 2011 at 3:34 am
As an escapee from the socialist labour utopia of what was great britain I see Mrs Thatcher as the first and perhaps only pollitician to see through the global warming scam and admit it, and she closed down the hopeless mines
See through it?? She started it!
Talk about revisionism. Sheesh. And she was still crapping on about it at the first UNFCCC conferences in the 90’s.
Get real.
UK coal mines: Safe working conditions, low sulfur product, no kids enslaved with zero protection.
richard verney says:
June 13, 2011 at 3:51 am
Just to correct the history, the UK went down the pan immediatedly following WW2 with the US insisting on the break up of the commonwealth
Richard, there are some good and fair points in your comment and I see faults on both sides. I still think Thatcher went way over the top in her approach though. As for NuLabour, let’s remember that Tony Blair’s father was a fundraiser for the Tory party, and that he himself was a product of the Cambridge PPPE course, along with the rest of the top politicos of both stripes.
Self-servatives, the lot of them. Grrrrrrr.
Cassie King says:
June 13, 2011 at 3:15 am
The UK social democrat regime seems utterly determined to destroy whats left of British wealth creating industry
You are referring to our current coalition government, the senior partner in which is Margaret Thatchers very own Conservative party, which is still pushing the same global warmist agenda she set.
Sorry to intrude on your stereotyping, as you were.
Jack says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:17 am
Maybe if we cut politicians
payby 50% we wouldn’t have these problems..Fixed it for you. Removing the top half of each one should do it.
Pascvaks says:
June 13, 2011 at 4:08 am
And Old Guy said, “Revolution be in the air me thinks me love. Grab some powder dear, we’re going to pay No.10 a visit tonight.”
“Guy Fawkes: The only man ever to enter parliament with honest intentions.”
@ tallbloke says: June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am
Absolutely stonking piece. One to paste into a document and save! Thanks!
@chris Edwards says: June 13, 2011 at 3:34 am
[ ] “I see Mrs Thatcher as the first and perhaps only pollitician to see through the global warming scam and admit it, and she closed down the hopeless mines…”
Yes, some credit for very belatedly recognising the Frankenstein monster she had created.
But, whilst after the 1984/85 strike a lot of “hopeless” mines were indeed (and belatedly) closed down, the process that she started, just like the cAGW monster she had created, carried on and still carries on uncontrolled.
By the early 1990s, the British coal industry was easily the most productive, the most efficient and the safest in Europe. Production costs were a third of those in Germany, a fifth of those in Spain. After Major privatised the industry at the end of 1994, AFTER privatising the power generators (directly contrary to the contemporary advice, which was to privatise both industries together), and with the structure of the electricity supply industry such that they had every possible incentive to pursue the “dash for gas” and just stick the infrastructure costs on consumers’ bills, the coal industry was in big trouble. With a mixture of inept management, increasing targetted “environmental” controls, starved of investment both directly and in the power generation plant, with continued Government incompetence and malice, the UK industry is now almost irelevant.
And 300 years supply of affordable and efficient energy effectively sterilised.
Tallbloke`s correct, Margaret Thatcher was of a mind to finish the power of the unions for good.
The most powerful union was the NUM, To finish the NUM she had to curb britains reliance on coal,and humiliate Arthur Scargill (e`s always worth a google) the NUM leader.
It was thought (by conservatives) that the anti-nuke brigade would see sense(lol), oil and gas would provide the rest.
Turning carbon dioxide into the jew of gasses was absolutely vital to wresting political power from the national union of mineworkers.
There is a peculiarly excellent documentary called Tory Tory Tory! by the bbc,If you can find it, it`s excellent
Post normal politics seems to be absolving the conservatives of any blame,
thats a pity,
there`s lots to go round.
Broadly speaking,it was a bit like this.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1xqo1_part-04-la-grde-arnaque-du-rechauff_tech
I was actually under the impression that this blog was about AGW/CAGW/global warming and this particular thread about economic policy being determined as a result of belief in AGW. Not a forum for uninformed American ignoramuses like ‘Tallbloke’ and his pals to peddle their prejudices and political propaganda.
[reply] Actually Mr Epigenes, I’m a Brit. and also a WUWT Moderator. TB-mod
Hmm, in Australia they are going to have a carbon tax and industry plans to just take it like sheep. So do UK industry types just have more backbone than Ozzies? I don’t get it.
Well, I guess that is one way to lower your ‘carbon’ emissions by 10%. Just move 10% of your businesses offshore. See how easy that was! And you can do it again year. China and India must be laughing all the way to the bank.
Take a look at the agenda for the CBI Energy Conference 2011 on 14th June here:
http://climatechange.cbi.org.uk/events/cbi-energy-conference-2011
And look at the venue – The Royal Society!
The URL tells us all we need to know – it’s about ‘climate change’ not energy security or efficiency. It starts with the false assumption that energy production affects the climate. The CBI is part of the problem not part of the solution. By their own policy failures they are, and remain, complicit in the collapse of the UK’s heavy industrial base.
“tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:02 am”
Well said, although I do blame unions and management also. Thatcher 50%, unions 25% mangement (or lack of) 25%.
My first day at first job after college in 1971, as I was going in for the first time, the work force was going out on strike we passd in a corridor. However one had to also take into account that we were making electrolytic capactitors on 1930’s vintage equipment to a 1940’s Post Office specification; we didn’t compete with Japanese and German competitors on price or quality. When modernisation came it was too little too late, and needless to say the factory became a housing development many years ago.
I guess we’re rushing into renewables because we got it so wrong in the 70s and 80s and there is no manufacturing left in the UK with a few exceptions.
I now work in logistics moving stuff on its final leg from China (mostly) to the retail outlet.
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2011/6/13/climate-change-removed-from-curriculum.html this seesm interesting English will not include climate chnage in curriculuim anymore by force
Gareth Phillips says:
June 13, 2011 at 12:30 am
To be honest this is little to do with green taxes. This is an old chestnut where banks and businesses threaten to flee abroad every time they hear something they don’t like. Usually it’s because of a tax on their obscene bonuses after losing our investments, or being asked to help sort out the mess they made in some other way. In the event very very few of them go, It seems they feel places like China may not treat them so kindly if they mess up when based in such authoritarian regimes.
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The outflow of jobs and industry to China is fairly obvious and well documented, and I don’t think that financial service industries are big targets of carbon taxes. It’s odd how libz expect industry to willing lay down and accept being taxed out of existence.
Also You apparently don’t realize how things operate in the PRC. The Chi-Coms may come down like a ton of bricks on their own local agitators, but they are very accomodating to businesses, which have relocated to the PRC. Afterall Why interupt your competition when they are in the process of committing suicide.
Mr TB mod can you see if my comments in the sin bin or i’ll re-type it.
[reply] Sorry, It’s lost in cyberspace. TB-mod
Polishing your assumptons Epigenes?
Now all we need are a bunch PATCO diehards (Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization) to come in and give a lecture on how Reagan “wrecked” the country.
Here in France rhe deep coal mines were closed under Mitterand and “La Départment des mines” switched over to testing imported cars! The French can never abolish anything. Still, I bet Maggie gave him a few whacks with her handbag to set him on the right track. I have familly who worked at the coalface. They tell me that what made mining unprofitable was the five day week, which meant three days of actual coal production.
I heard it was the reverse. Well, it’ll come out in the lawsuits.
“banjo says:
June 13, 2011 at 5:16 am
The most powerful union was the NUM, To finish the NUM she had to curb britains reliance on coal,and humiliate Arthur Scargill”
Classic use of “fear”, create an image of a bogeyman – then, in that case, moderate force was enough to defeat and destroy Scargill and whole collateral communities many of which are still broken today almost 30 years later, while the masses cheered.
Then create the Global warming bogeyman to manipulate the energy industry and be a general purpose stick to wave for mass control.
Nowadays the fear is debt, the nation’s credit card is maxed out, your home is at risk, it’s worse than we thought. Amplified by an ever desperate press that thrives on a diet of fear and aspiration to maintain its circulation. Market manipulations keeping the rich, rich, others get ripped off by the banks, there is misselling of anything from pensions, mortgage protection, product protection, driven by fear and other deception into the hands of rogues. Now care homes are mere cash machines for the few. All under the watchful eyes of and supported by each mainstream UK political party and it gets called enterprise and entrepeneurship.
Tory, Labour, Lib Dem, they all play the same game, milk the same cows, create the same bogeymen and laugh all the way to the same bailed out banks.
Too true! If we`re not scared, we don`t need `em.
If the costs of doing business rise for any reason, these costs are passed on to the consumers. When consumers do not buy the products at the new higher prices, the business fails. If a business does not want to fail, it must find an environment that does not have the costs that make its product undesirable. If companies can’t make a profit, investors will pull their money out of those companies and put their money in companies that will.
If a corporation is greedy ie it charges more for its products than they are worth, people simply do not buy the product, because they have a choice. Choices to make an exchange of money are made on the basis that consumers are better off with the product than they are with the money it takes to buy it. Greedy corporations are only a problem when government requires you to buy their product at their price regardless of value to the consumer. Think Obamacare. The insurance companies love it. Consumers not so much. Boeing did not like the costs of doing business in Washington state in the USA, so it built a plant in South Carolina where labor costs were cheaper. In that case, the power of the unions in Washington state was the determining factor. Climate regulation has the same effect, and not only will businesses leave the UK or any other country that imposes higher energy costs, but there will be no new business development either. No company in its right mind is going to develop in a country where it is guaranteed to fail.
If you wonder where the jobs went, the answer is somewhere else, and until it becomes cost effective to do increased business there, those jobs will stay gone. So people will have to go where the jobs are, accept less pay, or create their own jobs by creating value and selling it on the open market. Or they might elect people who make it easier for businesses to make money by hiring local talent rather than more difficult. The sad thing about the UK is that the CO2 push they are engaged in is based on faulty science AND the fact that their contribution to CO2 reduction is so insignificant as to have essentially no effect on the final outcome even if the CAGW advocates were right. The UK seems to have a martyr complex wherein it will valiantly die for the cause. There are causes worth dying for, but CAGW isn’t one of them.
Justa Joe says:
June 13, 2011 at 6:43 am
Now all we need are a bunch PATCO diehards (Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization) to come in and give a lecture on how Reagan “wrecked” the country.
banjo says …Why,that would be pure invention wouldn`t it?
That Margaret Thatcher did indeed start the politicisation of cagw isn`t.
Just in case you missed it.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1xqo1_part-04-la-grde-arnaque-du-rechauff_tech
OK thanks, i’ll try again.
At the start of the current economic crisis it was identified that the UK wouol have to go from a public sector economy to a more private sector economy to help the debt in this country but with these green taxes (Hidden mostly from the general Sheeple) and the high prices they bring the UK economy is on a knife edge and i’m no economist btu anything that is as negative to industry as the Cliamte Change act cannot be a good thing.
Although I’m sure the political elite will simply say that the green jobs that have been promised us will more than make up for any industry that quit’s the UK in the next couple of years. Or we can simply keep borrowing (Don’t expect the self-servantives, Non-Labour or Lib-Debts to stop borrowing) till the country goes bust.
tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 4:55 am
Cassie King says:
June 13, 2011 at 3:15 am
The UK social democrat regime seems utterly determined to destroy whats left of British wealth creating industry
You are referring to our current coalition government, the senior partner in which is Margaret Thatchers very own Conservative party, which is still pushing the same global warmist agenda she set.
Sorry to intrude on your stereotyping, as you were.
The current coalition regime is not right wing, it is what can only be described as a social democrat regime in terms of its aversion to right wing politics, its support for social democrat politics, its centrist verging on leftist policies. Under the new dual leadership of Cameron and Clegg we see a new labour style love of presentation politics, a love of half baked social philanthropic virtues in the gigantic funding of foreign aid which would be no concern to us if they were footing the bill, its obedience to the EU monster, its hatred of big heavy industries, its love of the modern chattering classes latest fashionable bleeding ecofascist NWO heart on sleeve causes. The regime of Cameron is not right wing, it is not even vaguely right wing anymore, it is a high tax elitist establishment pro EU dead left of dead centre party. A parasite supporting party of high taxes and high spending and eye watering borrowing. I do not recognize any of the values of the right in the coalition social democrat regime now in power in the UK, a PM that is proud to see himself as the successor to Phony Bliar. This PM has chosen his side, and chosen his allies and they are not right wing friends or right wing allies, the man like his coagulation of a party are as fake as a North Korean made Rolex.
Epigenes says:
June 13, 2011 at 5:55 am
I was actually under the impression that this blog was about ………
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Epi……. This blog is about learning and exchanging thoughts and ideas. Yes, the theme is decidedly about CAGW….or whatever, but the spectrum of topics range far and wide. One of the beautiful things about this blog is correcting misconceptions. Now, I wouldn’t thought it so difficult to discern, but some people’s beliefs blind them often. A moniker like Tall Bloke, Bloke being a term that isn’t often used in the states, one could have concluded TB was not American. But then, many are under the impression that skepticism is simply American right wing cause, championed by Fox news and Rush. Just to clear things up, skepticism is a world-wide view, while the right of American politics is decidedly skeptical,(Left/Right/Conservative/Liberal carry different meanings to different people) it isn’t the impetus nor force behind the skepticism. If one were to read or even just skim the archives of this blog, you’d see an international thrust to the articles. Many readers here are from countries other than the U.S. And, those countries’ skeptical movements are growing! Hopefully, G.B. will turn back this wave of insanity in their home. In Australia, the debate is very contentious. Canada’s skeptic camp is undaunted. New Zealand’s is very active. Other places around Europe are seeing the folly of this madness. We’re far from done, but the tide is turning.
UK why not leave the EU? Let them diddle with all this craziness and their socialist, overgoverned, sick economies. They don’t like you anyway. You have an English speaking world to join with all the advantages, resources and markets you could hope for. Oh we can probably eventually even straighten out Australia.
James Sexton
Hear Hear!
@ Tallbloke et al: I realise that this is will be unpopular but it is possible to have a quite different perspective of Margaret Thatcher.
At Wiki Ref 1 you will see that polls of 20th century prime ministers generally puts her within the top 5 rankings, in the company of the great wartime leaders such as Lloyd George, Churchill and Atlee.
When Mrs Thatcher was appointed in 1979, British industrial relations were in turmoil – probably as a legacy of Britain having been the first country to industrialise in the 19th century. The country was widely perceived to be in thrall to the trades unions and ungovernable without their approval – in 1974, after the miner’s strike, Ted Heath called an election on the issue “who governs Britain”, and lost. We were then universally referred to as the “sick man of Europe”.
Far from the industrial base being sound this was the era of uncontrolled wildcat strikes, motor industry bailouts (remember British Leyland, and how the British motorcycle industry was simply blown away by Japanese imports?) and further nationalisations (British Steel, British Aerospace etc).
The same applied to the mining industry: at Wiki Ref2 it appears that most (nationalised) pits were unprofitable. It was in fact cheaper to buy coal on the world market to fire our (again nationalised) power stations than buy it at its true cost from British pits – but of course the result would be another miners’ strike and the government of the day falling.
This was Margaret Thatcher’s inheritance – Britain undergoing what was almost a civil war in industrial relations. She fought the war and (as for the Falklands) prevailed – but at cost of the eternal hostility of sections of our society. She did much else in her 11 years as PM (deregulation, privatisations, supply side reforms, the Anglo-Irish agreement to name a few) and generally made Britain governable again, reducing public sector expenditure to about 40% of GDP. And while she had initial concerns over CO2 theory, she ultimately adopted a sceptical view.
I think you will find the historical perspective of Mrs Thatcher will continue in line with the 20th century polls I referred to above – one of the great 20th century British PMs.
Cassie King says:
June 13, 2011 at 8:01 am
The current coalition regime is not right wing, it is what can only be described as a social democrat regime in terms of its aversion to right wing politics, its support for social democrat politics, its centrist verging on leftist policies. Under the new dual leadership of Cameron and Clegg we see a new labour style love of presentation politics, a love of half baked social philanthropic virtues in the gigantic funding of foreign aid which would be no concern to us if they were footing the bill
I didn’t say it was right wing, I said it’s senior partner was the self same Conservative party which under Margaret Thatcher started the global warming scare and is still perpetuating it. Incidentally it is also the same Conservative party which took us into the E.U. in 1973, a move opposed by the Labour Party at the time, before it fell victim to careerist politicians like Tory Blair (Who is now an E.U. bigwig).
The UK’s careerist politicians are a set of lying, thieving, carpet bagging self-servatives who need lobbing out of the windows of Parliament into the river Thames. In my opinion.
It matters little what tallbloke or any of us say here or who we blame years ago – the FACT is a shot has been fired across the bow in Britain. The competitiveness of any company whether it is in Britain/North America/China lies in its ability to compete on a global scale in today’s world. At the heart of today’s businesses energy is the driving factor along with labor costs – when combining the two China and India are head and shoulders above the pack. Moreover, in the west companies have an additional burden – ridiculously dumb green taxes to fund even poorer designed Green government schemes seemingly designed by grade school students with no concept of economies of scale. Now in the case of the EU nations including Britain years of unchecked legal and illegal immigration have indeed delivered a death blow to already fragile economies stretching even more fragile social programs to the breaking point throughout the entire EU world. Surely sane governments would at least recognize how fragile their national economies are especially with this long recession pushing EU nations into bankruptcy or near the bankruptcy points. Surely this is not the point any sane government would dump a completely illogical Green tax on its own fragile economy struggling to recover in a zone of too many failing nations – perhaps other than Germany. Ross Perot here in North America who said: “You sign NAFTA and you’ll hear a giant sucking sound of jobs leaving the country.” And he was correct – just a few figures facts to make the point.
“1,100 FULL TIME JOBS LOST TO MEXICO, WHIRLPOOL LEAVING EVANSVILLE”
“LAKE MILLS, Iowa — Cummins Filtration in Lake Mills, Iowa, announced plans to cut about 400 jobs at the Lake Mills plant and shift them to San Luis Potosi, Mexico.”
“On July 1, Electrolux opened its new plant in Juarez, Mexico. It is one of two plants expected to take over production when the company closes the world’s largest refrigerator factory in Greenville early next year. The other is in Anderson, S.C.
Electrolux’s shutdown of the Greenville plant at 635 W. Charles St. will leave more than 2,700 people without jobs.”
“Eyewitness News is investigating vanishing jobs in the Triangle area. We’ve discovered 2007 is shaping up to be a bad year for people in the Triangle. By analyzing a state employment database, we’ve discovered that nearly a thousand people are losing their jobs to Mexico.”
“As part of the restructuring, Avon has apparently decided that moving jobs to Mexico will save them a ton of money. Avon Products will eliminate 1,200 positions — 2.8 percent of its overall work force — by 2013 as part of a reorganization.”
“Hershey to Cut 1,500 Jobs, Open Mexico Facility”
“On Tuesday, United Auto Workers (UAW) officials announced that auto parts-maker American Axle will close its Detroit-Hamtramck factory—the largest of its US facilities—and lay off between 500 and 600 workers. UAW officials claim these jobs are being moved to Mexico.”
“Honeywell International Inc. is planning to move 5,000 aerospace division jobs offshore over the next five years, according to internal documents that outline the company’s global development strategy.”
“Trade hawks hunting for the corporate villains behind the flight of U.S. manufacturing jobs to Mexico might find General Electric a handy target.
In the 14 years since the North American Free Trade Agreement dismantled most barriers to trade and investment between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, GE has sent thousands of U.S. jobs making everything from refrigerators to electric meters to Mexico.”
THe warnings Brits have been given is real – if green idiocy makes industry uncompetitive Britain too will hear a GIANT SUCKING SOUND of jobs leaving their nation. Ignore the warning at your own peril. We did and we all lost here in North America.
banjo says …Why,that would be pure invention wouldn`t it?
That Margaret Thatcher did indeed start the politicisation of cagw isn`t.
Just in case you missed it.
Actually I am well aware of M. Thatcher’s involvement with the nascent politicisation of CAGW. While her involvement with CAGW was regrettable blaming Thatcher for the demise of British industry as a whole is WAY overstated. From my recollection the UK economy was in trouble pre-Thatcher, and the commie infested Coal unions were about to push the UK economy over the brink. On the whole since she was also involved with the de-socialization and privatization of businesses in the UK her legacy must be considered positive.
Justa Joe says:
June 13, 2011 at 8:26 am
While her involvement with CAGW was regrettable blaming Thatcher for the demise of British industry as a whole is WAY overstated. From my recollection the UK economy was in trouble pre-Thatcher, and the commie infested Coal unions were about to push the UK economy over the brink. On the whole since she was also involved with the de-socialization and privatization of businesses in the UK her legacy must be considered positive.
“Regrettable”
Lolz
As a matter of fact Joe, I had a share in those industries before Thatcher and her pirate gang stole them and offered to sell my share back to me. She was not the paragon of laissez faire virtue my American friends think she was. She was just an ignorant grocer’s daughter used by her husband and his influential friends to steal from the public purse and promote the financial hocus pocus they were invested heavily into. The union members knew this and were trying to head her off at the pass when she put army personnel into police uniforms to beat the crap out of them. I know. I was there.
Irrespective of Margaret Thatchers achievements (and there were many) .
Her greatest mistake was using a relatively new and untried science to frighten voters into accepting the demise of the coal industry and its unions.
This fact does not alter my political views. (that politicians are generally sharp suited, self serving b [self snip]ds.
A curse on all their houses!
I’ve always been a bit confused about the UK. Think about it. They invented the digital computer, the jet engine, the programming language, made some of the best motorcycles in the world, has a centuries long tradition of tradesman/craftsmanship… Yet time and again some other country has “picked up the ball and run with it.” Trying to explain why is beyond me, but the number of examples is too vast for it to not have some sort of endemic/systemic cause.
A lot of ‘Thatcher destroyed British industry’ here, but I remember the other side of the coin, the situation pre-Thatcher was unsustainable and much of what Thatcher did was recognise the inevitable. The nationalised coal industry was digging deep-mined coal at substantially higher cost than open-cast could be imported from Poland or Australia, and in any case, electricity generation was moving to natural gas which was much cheaper. British steel was burning tons of this expensive coal to make steel which no one wanted so was just stockpiled (I recall that this was the first company to be making regular losses of over one million pounds a day), and British shipyards had huge capacity but no market in a world with a huge excess of shipping capacity. The motor and aircraft industries were fatally wounded long before Thatcher, hugely oversized, overmanned, badly managed and contraction was inevitable. Industrial relations were appalling, with many companies continually crippled by strikes despite facing serious problems in the marketplace. To blame Thatcher for the demise of British industry is silly- she just cut out a lot of the dead wood and unfortunately there wasn’t much left. Perhaps more could have been done to encourage ‘high-tech’ industries, but to suggest that Thatcher was a mindless wrecker motivated solely by the desire to break the trade unions is just wrong.
TomB says:
June 13, 2011 at 8:41 am
I’ve always been a bit confused about the UK. Think about it. They invented the digital computer, the jet engine, the programming language, made some of the best motorcycles in the world, has a centuries long tradition of tradesman/craftsmanship… Yet time and again some other country has “picked up the ball and run with it.” Trying to explain why is beyond me, but the number of examples is too vast for it to not have some sort of endemic/systemic cause.
Inept management and greed for the fast buck.
Wil June 13, 2011 at 8:25 am
Wil, you are absolutely right but your wisdom is far greater than that of successive British governments that have created a land where housing is massively expensive because of massive amounts of credit which had the effect of pushing money up to the already rich. So now an average person is approaching 40 before thay can afford to get on the housing ladder so it is inevitable there is demand for high wages.
We’ve already heard the giant sucking sound, except it was a blowing sound with British industrial jobs being offshored years ago under the pretence of creating a higher value UK sevice sector which produces little tangible and is itself in the process of going off shore.
While we should be ascending Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs, British governments seem to be intent on trying to force descent through debt and massive unemployment amongst the young while repeating a mantra that everyone must work for longer.
Google and ye shall recieve.
Part one of a series exploring the history of the people and ideas behind what became known as Thatcherism
tallbloke says:
June 13, 2011 at 5:00 am
Maybe if we cut politicians by 50% we wouldn’t have these problems..
ABRIDGE, v.t. To shorten. When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for people to abridge their king, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. –Oliver Cromwell
from Ambrose Bierce The Devil’s Dictionary
We make fun of dems for blaming Bush for Obama’s screw-ups. And Bush was President 3 years ago. You all are dragging out Thatcher? That’s close to 30 years ago. What, labor couldn’t fix things in 30 years?
Let’s get the terminology straight. Companies don’t ship jobs overseas. They ship CAPITAL overseas. “Shipping jobs overseas” is an emotionally charged phrase used by leftists. They don’t want to use the correct term, capital, because using that would start raising questions about taxes and regulations.
@TimC says: June 13, 2011 at 8:19 am
“The same applied to the mining industry: at Wiki Ref2 it appears that most (nationalised) pits were unprofitable. It was in fact cheaper to buy coal on the world market to fire our (again nationalised) power stations than buy it at its true cost from British pits – but of course the result would be another miners’ strike and the government of the day falling.”
Yes, some (not most) of the pits at the start of the strike (1984) were certainly unprofitable. Many reasons for that, not least the fact that the Government deliberately kept them going, with in some areas (like Nottinghamshire) big bonus schemes to keep the miners sweet whilst the coal stockpiles were built up in preparation for the strike. There is no question that the strike was political. There is no question that it was political on both sides and Scargill walked straight into the trap that had been set for him. The losers in the end? Certainly the Miners (despite Scargill pretending that it was a famous victory), and certainly the UK.
Yes coal was cheaper on the world market – but that was particularly the case in the period after 1989 when Poland, Ukraine and Russia were dumping coal on the market at any price they could get, to obtain hard currency. Don’t forget that in 1984/1985 there was very limited available capacity to import coal. The big import terminal at Immingham was still only a pipe dream.
But it was inept (privatised) management that entered into long term coal supply contracts with the Generators when the world market price was at an all time low.
You should check out the world price now and compare it with the indigenous price! And when the remnants of the UK industry go down the tube, what do you think the price of coal will be then?
Wil says:
June 13, 2011 at 8:25 am
It matters little what tallbloke or any of us say here or who we blame years ago – the FACT is a shot has been fired across the bow in Britain. The competitiveness of any company whether it is in Britain/North America/China lies in its ability to compete on a global scale in today’s world. At the heart of today’s businesses energy is the driving factor along with labor costs – when combining the two China and India are head and shoulders above the pack.
==================================================================================
Your comments on NAFTA are spot on. Cheap reliable energy is the only solution to global competition. And, as you point out, the trade arrangements are harmful. While there are parallels to the U.K.’s and U.S.’s economic predicaments, the situations are not entirely the same. I’ve long been an advocate of not competing in the global markets, or more accurately selectively competing. I’m not sure that the U.K. has the raw resources to be able to make that decision. The U.S. does.
We don’t need to compete with China and India or any other cheap labor country. We choose to. The U.S. can turn our economy around on a whim. It simply takes the populace to have the fortitude to say “enough”. We’ve got everything here we need, (though we may still have to import fuel) if we decided to, we could increase production so as to decrease the price of oil significantly world wide. If we chose to start opening energy plants using coal and nuclear as fuels, the cost would go down and reliability would go up. More, if we were to mandate the materials used in increasing our fuel and energy output were to be only from U.S. providers, we would be essentially done in turning our economic woes around. Yes, we would have to rescind NAFTA and other like treaties and withdraw from the WTO, but I see these as positive steps. To steal from a great singer/song writer born of the U.K. Imagine the resurgence of the steel mills of the rust belt! Imagine the jobs and prosperity it would create! Imagine the deficit reduction! Imagine!
Here in Canada Prime Minister Steven Harper is slowly dropping this AGW BS. Through his leadership Canada may have the most stable economy in the world today, and he has a majority government for the next 4 years.
Now in the province of BC we have a wingnut government that has given us carbon tax and has the ear of David Suzuki and Andrew Weaver who are both residents. Think of BC as Canada’s version of Caflifornia.
As a person who worked on the shop floor of British industry during the period Tallbloke refers to, I have different perceptions from his and I’d be happy to debate the politics of that period with him, but WUWT is not the appropriate place to do so. Let’s stick to science and related issues.
“The union members knew this and were trying to head her off at the pass when she put army personnel into police uniforms to beat the crap out of them. I know. I was there.” TB
I’ve never seen unions endeavor to do anything that wasn’t in their immediate self serving interest. Sorry that I cannot share in your praise for the Beneficence of labor unions. They cause more harm than good in this era. Some union thugs ought to have their violent tactics turned on them in kind.
Justa Joe says:
June 13, 2011 at 10:00 am
Some union thugs ought to have their violent tactics turned on them in kind.
You are of course entitled to your opinion. In my experience, most union members are neither thugs nor violent.
Oxonpool says:
June 13, 2011 at 9:54 am
As a person who worked on the shop floor of British industry during the period Tallbloke refers to, I have different perceptions from his and I’d be happy to debate the politics of that period with him, but WUWT is not the appropriate place to do so.
Fair enough. Thanks for allowing me a little steamoff.
AGW #!!//???? ##$**7 $**7 \8C*
Britain is travelling, no! – Britain is tumbling – down the s&&7e chute to oblivion and our Politicians are blithely…..or is it callously unseeing – “there’s a world to save don-cha know dear thing!?”.
But Camoron’s wife’s dad is making money, so too his bestist Cleggover [ mate?] coalition pal…. who’s wife works in a related industry [windmills and boondoggles]- conflict of interest? You Bet!
Do they care? Not much, money is all and the taxpayer can go and ‘cast his seed’ off.
@jonjermey says: June 13, 2011 at 1:23 am
How on earth could the opinion of “Steven Weinberg” about religion possibly have any meaning past the inane? Why would we take the opinion of rock stars and scientists seriously outside there area of expertise?
What we have to look forward to.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-Day_Week
@James Sexton
I read the otiose, patronising garbage you posted but I’ve no idea what point you are trying to make re your reply to my post.
Prolixity is no substitute for being incisive.
Apparently tallbloke is a moderator here, at least so it has informed me. I thought that any individual given that responsibility would see the benefit to this blog of refraining from posting its political prejudice. Is going off topic not against the rules because that is what it did?
I will be succinct, James. My point was valid yours is incoherent. After all, I did upset tallbloke.
On a somewhat related note a new study from the UK suggests electric cars provide little to no improvement in CO2 emissions when all factors, including manufacturing and recycling the batteries, are included in the calculation
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/health-science/electric-cars-may-not-be-so-green-after-all-says-british-study/story-e6frg8y6-1226073103576
Of course the Obama administration has funneled close to a $trillion to two electric car companies who, if they are successful, will produce most of their cars elsewhere and will price them so that any subsidies given to their customers will only go to those who already wealthy.
Epigenes says:
June 13, 2011 at 11:56 am
Apparently tallbloke is a moderator here, at least so it has informed me. I thought that any individual given that responsibility would see the benefit to this blog of refraining from posting its political prejudice. Is going off topic not against the rules because that is what it did?
I will be succinct, James. My point was valid yours is incoherent. After all, I did upset tallbloke.
I get more upsetting things free with my cereal Epigenes. And unlike other blogs, people are free to express their opinions here, moderator or not. My personal politics doesn’t interfere with my objectivity when deciding whether to approve the posts of others, so what is your beef? That I was “off topic”?
Considering the way the CBI cuddled up to the Tories in the past, I hardly think pointing out the Tory party obsession with AGW Greenness is off topic. Nor is the fact that Mater Thatcher started the whole scam.
Epigenes says:
June 13, 2011 at 11:56 am
“Apparently tallbloke is a moderator here,..”
I too find it most disappointing that this thread rapidly degenerated into UK tribal politics, mainly left wing in nature, excoriating a leader deposed in 1990, for the past decade of legislation for the abatement of CO2.
It is also regretable that a moderator should indulge in vitriolic participation rather than moderation from a position of benign neutrality.
The interpretations of history voiced here are both facile and blinkered by class. The realities under which policy was formed are not revealed until many years after the event, when the constraints at the time upon the “Party de jour” are released.
Since all three UK parties have been avid adherents to the AGW nonsense, vying with each other for a seat on the right hand of Gaia for decades, it seems somewhat invidious to differentiate between them, and in so doing diminish WUWT
The vast majority of companies that moved to Mexico following NAFTA had already made the decision to leave the US. The only difference NAFTA made was that the moved to Mexico instead of India or S. Korea.
As to the claim that NAFTA destroyed us manufacturing. Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is that US manufacturing today is larger than it was in the pre-NAFTA days. The difference is productivity. US ingenuity has made it possible for plants to make more stuff using less labor.
In most circles, increased productivity is considered a good thing, since it enables companies to make products for less, while paying their workers the same amount, and sometimes more.
Another point that many people forget, is that when consumers buy cheaper stuff from overseas, the money those consumers save doesn’t evaporate. They either save it (which enlarges the pool of money available for investing in new companies) or they spend it (which increases demand for other products, leading to increased employment in those other areas)
Trade doesn’t destroy jobs, it moves them around. This is painfull for those people who’s jobs are being replaced, but the policies needed to protect those jobs are even more painfull in the long run.
How quickly they forget.
“Britain, before Thatcher, was a country settling into its role as ”the sick man of Europe.” Its journalists and scholars had produced a shelf of books suggesting that the decline was terminal. Her election was a signal that the sick man wanted to survive.”
http://www.nytimes.com/1987/05/31/magazine/thatcher-s-capitalist-revolution.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
In Thatcher’s defense, pretty much everybody believed in AGW back then. The work debunking the myth didn’t start until years later.
I’ve been studying the labor movement for years, from what I’ve found the only people who were enriched by labor unions were the people running them. The long term affect has always been the same, they destroy the industries that host them. The only place where unions have been successfull in the longer term has been in state owned industries, where the power of the state can force people to pay for the union products, whether they want them or not, and the power of the state can prevent non-union companies from competing.
roger says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:32 pm
I too find it most disappointing that this thread rapidly degenerated into UK tribal politics, mainly left wing in nature, excoriating a leader deposed in 1990, for the past decade of legislation for the abatement of CO2.
It is also regretable that a moderator should indulge in vitriolic participation rather than moderation from a position of benign neutrality.
I was a participant here long before I was a moderator, and I moderate from a position of benign neutrality, and participate with the full vigour of my opinion. I have now ceased moderating on this thread since Epigenes and yourself have made an issue out of it.
The interpretations of history voiced here are both facile and blinkered by class. The realities under which policy was formed are not revealed until many years after the event, when the constraints at the time upon the “Party de jour” are released.
Yes, we’ll see how many more FOIA requests get turned down on spurious grounds. They work for me, and they will be answerable to the public as a whole for the corrupt conniving they have entered into with wind power producers among others.
Since all three UK parties have been avid adherents to the AGW nonsense, vying with each other for a seat on the right hand of Gaia for decades, it seems somewhat invidious to differentiate between them, and in so doing diminish WUWT
That’s a laugh. You don’t see strongly biased political opinion expressed here every day? You must be averting your gaze.
Sorry for putting up another comment, I was reminded of this point on another blog.
The problem lies in how our (US) govt defines what is and what isn’t a manufacturing job. It is defined based on the primary activity of the company that pays your checks.
Take for example an accountant who works for an auto company. Because auto companies engage in primarily manufacturing, everyone who works for that company, even the accountant, is counted as part of the manufacturing bucket.
Now let the auto company spin off it’s accounting dept into a subsidiary. That subsidiary does mostly accounting work. Accounting work is considered service industry.
Even though the accountant in question works at the same desk, for the same boss, doing the same work, according to the govt he is no longer counted as a manufacturing industry worker, but is now a service industry worker.
Remember that when people talk about the decline of manufacturing workers in the US.
(This kind of divestiture was a big deal during most of the 80’s and 90’s, as large corporations spun off divisions that they had bought earlier in order to get back to their core competancies.)
Mark Wilson says:
June 13, 2011 at 1:51 pm
In Thatcher’s defense, pretty much everybody believed in AGW back then. The work debunking the myth didn’t start until years later.
According to ‘the great global warming swindle’ documentary linked above, She went to the Royal Society and said,” There’s money on the table if you can prove this stuff”. Which of course, they did. After all, the head of the Royal Soc dined at the same club as the top Tories. Even after (according to Lawson) the secret report said “All clear, nothing to worry about”, Thatcher still carried on the charade at the UNFCC gigs, revelling in her domination afforded by her chemistry degree. IMO she was a megalomaniac loon, desperate to stay important, so glossed over the correct scientific advice.
The revisionism going on to exonerate her and the excuses being provided why we shouldn’t be told until many years later as roger advocates are laughable.
Wriggle wriggle.
This is an interesting series of comments on the history of business, government, and labor relations in the UK. Now can we get back to the important business of how the arrange the deck chairs?
The Titanic was a British ship, was it not?
Tallbloke, thx for your response.
I dispute that you are being objective and I also consider that you are factually wrong. Mrs Thatcher ordered an investigation into AGW, as she was obliged to do, but ultimately rejected it. She lost power shortly after this and the scam was taken up by her successors. Her rejection was based on her scientific intuition as a research chemist.
There really is a rogues gallery of politicians out there more worthy of criticism than Mrs Thatcher in this matter and you know their names as well as I do. Not one of them has a scintilla of scientific intuition, or undertaken any training in science, but they are knowingly peddling lies and propaganda.
My last post on this.
nc says: June 13, 2011 at 9:49 am
[Here in Canada Prime Minister Steven Harper is slowly dropping this AGW BS.]
nc, these quote go back more than a decade. He is not dropping it, he Never had it!
“Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations.”
“Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant.”
“Carbon dioxide which is a naturally occurring gas vital to the life cycles of this planet”
“This may be a lot of fun for a few scientific and environmental elites in Ottawa, but ordinary Canadians from coast to coast will not put up with what this will do to their economy and lifestyle”
“We can debate whether or not… CO₂ does or does not contribute to global warming. I think the jury is out.”
“My party’s position on the Kyoto Protocol is clear and has been for a long time. We will oppose ratification of the Kyoto Protocol and its targets. We will work with the provinces and others to discourage the implementation of those targets. And we will rescind the targets when we have the opportunity to do so”
With sane government, inexpensive energy, low taxes, stable banks, educated workforce, declining unemployment, increasing manufacturing and practically unlimited natural resources, Canada is in good shape.
Growth requires cheep energy and a working banking system, the people will do the rest on their own.
FWIW, at another place and time I where it is not off topic, I would present some information to correct your erroneous opinion. Suffice it for here and now to refer you to the books and stories regarding the Williamson County Massacre. There are still to this day no shortage of union members who do not hesitate to employ crimes and violence to achieve their goals and support anyone the Democrat Party pushes forward as a candidate, even a yellow dog as the old saying goes. Anyone who talks to them knows this and is not the least bit surprised. They make no secret of their hostility towards their critics and willngness to do just about anything it takes to get what they want.
Epigenes says:
June 13, 2011 at 9:21 pm
Tallbloke, thx for your response.
I dispute that you are being objective and I also consider that you are factually wrong. Mrs Thatcher ordered an investigation into AGW, as she was obliged to do, but ultimately rejected it. She lost power shortly after this and the scam was taken up by her successors. Her rejection was based on her scientific intuition as a research chemist.
Can you point me to the key statement she made rejecting the AGW hypothesis. Thanks.
There really is a rogues gallery of politicians out there more worthy of criticism than Mrs Thatcher in this matter and you know their names as well as I do. Not one of them has a scintilla of scientific intuition, or undertaken any training in science, but they are knowingly peddling lies and propaganda.
My last post on this.
Hmmm, not very logical. If they know no science, then they can say they went on what the IPCC ‘consensus’ said. Thatcher, according to her science and energy minister of the time Nigel Lawson, was made aware that there was nothing to worry about, but continued to peddle the lies and propaganda for another 8 years before being ousted. You seem overly keen to defend the indefensible for her. Maybe you are the one who isn’t being objective?
D. Patterson says:
June 13, 2011 at 9:55 pm
Suffice it for here and now to refer you to the books and stories regarding the Williamson County Massacre.
An interesting read, thanks for that:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herrin_massacre
Croly described the retaliation for the deaths of two strikers (the third had been mortally wounded) “atrocious”, but noted that while the perpetrators were likely to escape punishment, those who harmed strikers—such as Hamrock after Ludlow, or Wheeler after Bisbee—likewise frequently escaped justice.[16] Croly also observed that the local government of Herrin was sympathetic to the union, as was public sentiment, and under such circumstances, the union has a responsibility to police its own members.[17]
So the violent thugs with machine guns hired by the mine owner who reneged on his agreement with the union shot and killed union members before the union members retaliated.
Now you have a read about the Peterloo massacre:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peterloo_Massacre
And then have a think about how much say the British people have in the crazy carbon dioxide policies of their government, given that, as Epigenes pointed out, all three main political parties subscribe to the AGW nonsense.
@ Tallbloke: I agree with Epigenes that IMHO you are letting anti-Thatcher prejudice run away with you.
In 1990, while still Prime Minister, Mrs Thatcher gave a speech to the Royal Society as at the following link:
http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/108046
The concern du jour was then acid rain on which the speech centred, but about half-way through (at “To take as an example the problem of greenhouse gas”) she gave a well-nuanced resume of the arguments on each side of the debate showing clearly that she understood the main issues (prior to the hockey team’s contributions of course). And she was the democratically elected prime minister of the UK entitled to put HMG’s views to the UN – but they needed acceptance by many other countries before UN action could be taken.
The IPCC was set up in 1988 and issued its first AR in 1990. You say that Thatcher, having being advised there was nothing to worry about, “continued to peddle the lies and propaganda for another 8 years before being ousted” (in 1990, so as from 1982). On the basis that WUWT contributors for the most part accept that the science still isn’t settled today, I’m afraid your polemics just don’t stack up with the facts or the state of scientific knowledge, as in 1982 or today.
@TimC thx for your support.
Tallbloke posts like a typical AGW troll. No objectivity, posts lies and has no sense of priority. When, like the troll, it loses the debate it reverts to making impossible demands.
This individual is supposed to be a moderator but is waging war on just about every poster on this thread.
Epigenes says:
June 14, 2011 at 6:58 am
Tallbloke posts like a typical AGW troll. No objectivity, posts lies and has no sense of priority. When, like the troll, it loses the debate it reverts to making impossible demands.
If asking for a link to the statement Thatcher made recanting her belief in AGW as you say she did is an impossible demand, then no such statement exists, and so her alleged recantation of AGW belief is unproven. You need to sort out your logic as a priority
This individual is supposed to be a moderator but is waging war on just about every poster on this thread.
I’m not ‘supposed to be a moderator’ Epigenes, I AM a moderator. Which has exactly nothing to do with the views I express as an individual. I have expressed agreement with several other posters on this thread (and several have expressed agreement with me too) and said clearly I see fauilts in all the political parties approach to AGW. Your problem is your blind love for Margaret Thatcher and blind rage against anyone who dares revile her. It’s tawdry, and unbecoming for a man of your age.
Now, that’s one each, so instead of trading further insult, why don’t you just substantiate your claim that “in the end she rejected it” and tell us when she did so.
Thanks
Tallbloke: to come to Epigenes’ aid, while I have not read the book myself the URL below refers to a Christopher Booker article in the Daily Telegraph saying “In 2003, towards the end of her last book Statecraft … [Thatcher] issued what amounts to an almost complete recantation of her earlier views…” (the rest of the article no doubt speaks for itself):
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7823477/Was-Margaret-Thatcher-the-first-climate-sceptic.html
Adopting a similar approach to that mentioned in another recent WUWT article, will you please show us where in this thread Epigenes has demonstrated either “blind love” or “blind rage”, as you referred to it, towards Mrs Thatcher or her detractors?
Thanks. I do not seem able to find this myself.
TimC, thanks. My main point is that according to the GGWS documentary, she was told by her scientific advisers that there was no big need for concern at a much earlier stage, but continued to grandstand AGW both for her political purpose in killing the mining communities and for her personal aggrandisement at the UNFCCC conferences.
I can only suppose such dishonesty and callous disregard for people’s livelihoods passes for ‘Statesmanship’ these days.
Epigenes says:
June 13, 2011 at 11:56 am
@James Sexton
I read the otiose, patronising garbage you posted but I’ve no idea what point you are trying to make re your reply to my post.
Prolixity is no substitute for being incisive.
Apparently tallbloke is a moderator here, at least so it has informed me. I thought that any individual given that responsibility would see the benefit to this blog of refraining from posting its political prejudice. Is going off topic not against the rules because that is what it did?
I will be succinct, James. My point was valid yours is incoherent. After all, I did upset tallbloke.
============================================================================
lol, wow, seems I’ve made a friend. You point was valid? What I commented on, was your errant assumption that TallBloke was, and I quote, an “uninformed American ignoramuse[s]” and your errant assumptions about this blog. In other words, I tried to help.
You don’t like my tone? Sorry, perhaps you should check yours at the door. I typically wouldn’t have commented, but, apparently you were confused about some things. While I understand, it may sound patronizing, you obviously needed some clear, yet gentle wording to clear up your misunderstanding. Further, I don’t believe you can describe your comments to me as succinct, when you fail to connect historical politics with economic policy.
Epigenes, TB doesn’t need my help, and neither does this blog, but I’ve been here for a long time, and when I see people making errant assumptions and sweeping generalizations about some of the other long time regulars here and this blog itself, I tend to be a bit offensive, and intentionally so.
For what its worth, I like TB, but he is indeed capable of much more cerebral offerings.(He’s plenty of posts in the archives here, and I’d invite you to peruse them, or you can pop by his blog.) I thought it well known that M. Thatcher recanted her views on AGW. (TimC provides a link above.) Personally, I adored Maggie Thatcher. Yes, she was on the wrong side of history re this one topic, but for anyone who served as long as she did, it would be impossible not to see errors with the benefit of hindsight. And, I would have engaged in the conversation, but, as you did so succinctly put it, (paraphrasing) ‘Uninformed American ignoramuses probably shouldn’t engage in a discussion with Brits about Britain’s political history. And, taking a page from another American fan of M. Thatcher, I am much chagrin to speak ill of a fellow compatriot of cause.
Really? Wordy? lol, no, you haven’t seen wordy from me.
Best wishes,
James
Tallbloke: thank you, but do I then have it right that the only authority on which you rely for your “lies and propaganda” (and now “dishonesty”) comment is second-hand (hearsay) remarks in a documentary film which even Channel 4 described as controversial when screening it? Don’t you look for rather more evidence before using as pejorative terms as these?
How would you have handled the 1984 miner’s strike, when NUM had already brought down the Heath government in 1974 and Scargill clearly hoped to bring down the Thatcher government too (re-elected just the previous year with a 144 seat majority)? Given way to the NUM’s demands to keep open pits until NUM itself decided otherwise? Why should the miners alone be insulated from economic and industrial developments –and why then didn’t Blair’s government look at re-opening the pits when later elected with a whopping majority?
We will obviously never see eye-to-eye over this, and it’s gone on too long anyway. Feel free just to treat my questions as hypothetical – I’m not minded to post again on this thread.