• This topic has 56 replies, 32 voices, and was last updated 4 years ago by poah.
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  • Tesla chooses Berlin, gives UK a miss. What’s your take?
  • Malvern Rider
    Free Member

    Guardian Reader: ‘Told you so, you dumb clucks’
    Mail Reader: ‘We didn’t want that vile creature over here anyway, he’s weird, anyway we make Jaguar’

    I’m concerned over various reports of brain-drain and the predicted ongoing decline of British engineering. To me it seems likely that the brand of ‘globalism‘ which English Nationalists most fear and detest will be the one to most enjoy the coming takeover boom which their destabilising decision has (predictably) ushered in. Would like to remain optimistic but I’m feeling a bit ‘factory-farmed lukewarm sausage roll at a boot-sale, with a styrofoam cup of tea in rainy Rhyl’ at the minute. Which aptly describes the highpoint of my summer. Nothing much wrong with that, but when they said the future was going to be so bright we’d have to wear shades I didn’t know that they meant ‘scratched 1970’s £1 market-stall sunglasses made in a sweatshop 5000 miles away ‘bright’.

    Give me hope, Obi-Wan. Will bootstraps and onyerbike be sufficient?

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2019/11/13/elon-musk-says-europes-first-tesla-factory-will-go-to-germany-over-the-uk-because-of-brexit/

    tjagain
    Full Member

    Sensible business decision. Most international companies would do this. Why risk putting your european facility in a country that might not be in the EU

    They are not the only company to do so.

    mrmonkfinger
    Free Member

    Predictable loss of large manufacturing type company is utterly predictable. It’s easier to work in Europe, so that’s where they’ll go.

    Suicide squad, attack!

    perchypanther
    Free Member

    In other news…….

    Pope wears funny hat.

    Bear shit discovered in woods.

    FuzzyWuzzy
    Full Member

    As much as I’d have liked a Gigafactory in the UK I’m not convinced it was ever a serious contender, even if Brexit wasn’t a thing.

    But hey with the rise of an all powerful British empire under the Tories I’m sure Tesla will come crawling back wanting to open a UK specific Gigafactory in the future (sigh)

    uniqueusername
    Full Member

    Europe drives on the right us on the left
    Europe is a connected land mass we are an island
    Europe is working/regulating collectively we are trying to leave

    Why would we even be considered?

    mrmoofo
    Full Member

    Once Putin has taken the USSR back, it will give Tesla a footing in the Russian Empire market. So sensible decision by Tesla.

    How viable is Tesla these days?

    P-Jay
    Free Member

    But hey with the rise of an all powerful British empire under the Tories I’m sure Tesla will come crawling back wanting to open a UK specific Gigafactory in the future (sigh)

    We don’t want any of that forin muck over here, we’ll have our own EVs, it’ll be the Body of an Austin Princess draped over a milk float chassis.

    aP
    Free Member

    Tesla already have a big operation in Belgium. Putting this new facility in Germany makes so much more sense than the UK. And even better they don’t have to deal with Priti Patel.

    kimbers
    Full Member

    EU have been late to the game on EVs but have started investing in it

    UK car industry helped get this initiative started

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/davekeating/2019/05/02/europe-launches-multibillion-euro-initiative-for-electric-car-batteries/

    Once we had decided to put up regulatory , customs & tarrif barriers between ourselves & the single market

    Our being left behind on things like this were inevitable

    Malvern Rider
    Free Member

    Why would we even be considered?

    Good point. I don’t think we were. Anyway, in other news today …

    Minehead man claims feral ferret stole his winning Euromillions lottery ticket

    The man (who prefers to remain unnamed) told Ginny Swiggs of the Daily Bleat that he is ‘up at the crack of dawn on my bike shovel in hand and Digging For Victory’

    nuke
    Full Member

    null

    Drac
    Full Member

    It’s nothing to do with car production in the U.K. it’s because the EU wanting to ban diesels.

    cookeaa
    Full Member

    Says it all really.

    The UK is a car obsessed country that’s about to miss the boat on the next significant change in automotive manufacture and engineering.

    Closest the UK has come is giving that Dyson chap some research money so he can piss off to Singapore do a wee bit of R&D here and then declare the whole idea of leccy car non-viable…
    Don’t worry there’s still JLR (owned by TATA this week) which will no doubt eventually end up just sticking EV kit from other companies (such as Tesla) in an overpriced Chassis…

    Marin
    Free Member

    Stupid island about to make trade more difficult or big no barriers Europe.

    Malvern Rider
    Free Member

    Speaking at the factory, which is already producing test vehicles, Palmer said Aston Martin was targeting the tens of thousands of multimillionaire women in countries such as the US and China who are able to spend more than £140,000 on a car.

    “The DBX is seen as being neither male- nor female-biased – it’s neutral,” he said, referring to the results of testing with wealthy SUV owners.

    I like have cake and eat it, with my messages mixed and neutral. It’s about sending a strong signal but in the weakest way possible.

    nedrapier
    Full Member

    “Forget Brexit, Tesla was never going to build a UK gigafactory”

    https://www.wired.co.uk/article/tesla-gigafactory-musk-brexit

    Musk’s quick take on the Brexit situation ignores a more fundamental reason to avoid investing in the UK: a lack of talent.

    The UK’s skills shortage has cost businesses £6.3 billion in the last year alone as they struggled to hire the right people, according to research from the Open University. Three in five hiring managers have admitted that the skills shortage has worsened over the last year.

    This severe recruitment crisis meant that 69,000 to 186,000 engineering workers left the UK each year since 2016 to be replaced with only 46,000 engineering students and apprenticeships.

    It short, it would have been almost impossible for Tesla to find the 30,000 workers that are rumoured to be the target number for the new factory by the target deadline of 2021. And as Musk hinted in his comments, Germany’s engineering talent was part of the attraction.

    cougar:

    It’s nothing to do with car production in the U.K. it’s because the EU wanting to ban diesels.

    Germany wants to be able to ban diesels, and has made their own laws to allow it.

    Germany could also become Tesla’s biggest consumer base in Europe. This is partly because the country’s federal court permits individual cities to ban diesel vehicles altogether, and several cities — including Frankfurt, Munich, and Berlin — have already banned older diesel models that burn fuel less efficiently.

    It’s almost like Germany is a sovereign nation with control over its laws?

    mrmonkfinger
    Free Member

    This severe recruitment crisis meant that 69,000 to 186,000 engineering workers left the UK each year since 2016 to be replaced with only 46,000 engineering students and apprenticeships.

    This also.

    Getting quality staff is a nightmare.

    Edukator
    Free Member

    My take? Musk is getting more sleep and is making good choices again after a year off the rails.

    Drac
    Full Member

    Germany wants to be able to ban diesels, and has made their own laws to allow it.

    🤦🏻‍♂️

    wobbliscott
    Free Member

    This decision, like most decisions like this, are down to the incentives offered by the government of the country. There would have been a bidding war between nations and Germany won and it suited Tesla to stoke the fire of the competition with the odd snipped into the media as and when it suited them.

    Access to the European market is not an issue. My wife recently bought a BMW X3….that was made in the US as all X3’s are made outside of the EU. International trade arrangements are not really an issue or major consideration.

    We can only speculate on the real reason why they located it there…we don’t know. But Germany does have a very good electric vehicle sector, so on technical merits alone it would have probably been the best bet. If it was due to Brexit then why has France been overlooked? they have a motor industry every bit as big and good as the German one….Why not Spain or Portugal who have big production plants too? To say it is all down to one single factor, i.e. Brexit, is just a gross over-simplification of a very complex decision.

    hols2
    Free Member

    kelvin
    Full Member

    was made in the US as all X3’s are made outside of the EU. International trade arrangements are not really an issue or major consideration.

    Hello caller! You can buy a car made anywhere, that doesn’t change the fact that making key components (engine/battery etc) either inside the same trading block, on in a country with a trade arrangements that facilitate the movements of parts as much as possible, isn’t advantageous to the manufacturer and customer. Car manufacturers already here have made it clear how much it will cost them in money, time and hassle if/when we leave the single market, why would any manufacturer walk into that situation when planning a big new investment?

    nedrapier
    Full Member

    Sorry Drac! Wrong mod, erk!

    bikebouy
    Free Member

    Europe drives on the right us on the left
    Europe is a connected land mass we are an island
    Europe is working/regulating collectively we are trying to leave

    Why would we even be considered?

    Agreed. Also, why would a business person want to be involved with a bunch of lying retarded view politicians? Politicians that want to limit and restrict business, over complicate trade laws and transactional nightmares.
    Brexit, pure and simple.

    The brain drains been going on since June2016, a mass IT talent pool soon started to move to other countries when this Tory bunch of retards pushed for leaving the EU. Now the only way anyone will ever invest in an island full of people who constantly looks backwards is if BL started building the Allegro all over again… because some stupid people think the UK was better back then.

    Bunch of idiots.

    C’mon LyingBloHard, admit your failings and your parties retarded viewpoint before the 3 election..

    votchy
    Free Member

    Don’t worry there’s still JLR (owned by TATA this week) which will no doubt eventually end up just sticking EV kit from other companies (such as Tesla) in an overpriced Chassis…

    JLR joint venture with BMW on EV powertrains

    Watch this space for the JLR BEV’s coming to a dealership near you…

    Malvern Rider
    Free Member

    How can you blame the Tories?

    It’s not as if the majority population of Britain is asleep at the wheel, or non-engaged/uneducated/‘stupid’ people? Surely we know what’s going on here? The electorate are not all knuckle-dragging, tabloid-gobbling EDL types sucking up to Boris and Nigel because they’re scared of The Bearded Ghost of Lenin and them book-learnin’ folk?

    Brain-drain is real. The point is what to do?

    Cougar
    Full Member

    I do wonder how much more it’s going to take, just how bad it has to get before the brexit deniers admit they might have got it wrong?

    Musk: We’re going to mainland Europe because of the uncertainty surrounding brexit.
    Leavers: See, this is why we need to get brexit done, to get rid of the uncertainty!

    Like, people aren’t investing in Britain because of a fear that we might be ****ed afterwards, so the conclusion is to actually get on with being ****ed then at least we’ll know exactly how ****ed we are. I can’t even.

    Even on this very thread we’ve got apologists going “well, it’s probably not just brexit…” Which may be true, but if it’s a factor then we should be taking that seriously rather than hand-waving it, should we not?

    Answer me this: Since the referendum, how many companies have flocked to the UK because of the wonderful new opportunities and exciting trade world deals brexit is going to provide?

    Cougar
    Full Member

    How can you blame the Tories?

    How can you not?

    Brexit means brexit.

    No deal is better than a bad deal.

    They need us more than we need them.

    Easiest deal in history.

    Get brexit done.

    Take back control.

    Need I go on?

    Drac
    Full Member

    Need I go on?

    Well there was this guy and his bus not sure what happened to him after it was proved a lie.

    dovebiker
    Full Member

    This isn’t just today’s problem, it’s been well-known for the last 10 years plus. A lot is simply demographics as about 50% of the UK’s engineering / technical workforce is 55+ and is going to retire in the next decade. There’s a structural deficit of about 50,000 a year and foreign investors aren’t going to come to the UK to build a high-tech production facility as we wind-up the drawbridge to foreign workers.
    Besides, in our post-Brexit utopia with 100% employment, all school-leavers will be gainfully employed digging potatoes and turnips, picking fruit and veg or wiping the arses of self-entitled, post-war geriatrics

    thisisnotaspoon
    Free Member

    The UK’s skills shortage has cost businesses £6.3 billion in the last year alone as they struggled to hire the right people, according to research from the Open University. Three in five hiring managers have admitted that the skills shortage has worsened over the last year.

    I’m not sure how I feel about that though.

    The company I work for has just finished a massive recruitment drive (it’s very cyclical, 3 years ago they made me redundant along with about half the workforce). As part of this they recruited heavily from abroad, allegedly as there were no suitable candidates in the UK. Which I can see being true for a few more senior positions (e.g. experience working on a specific type of oil/gas/chemical plant that maybe isn’t in the UK, e.g. Fracking). But when it comes to the mid-career “bums on seats” type engineers, I can’t help but feel that they’re just trying to increase the supply and suppress wages because yes, engineers are expensive (or well paid, depending whether your an engineer or not)! As there are certainly a good number of out of work engineers.

    paton
    Free Member
    TiRed
    Full Member

    The R&D centre is the real loss here. We are leaders in automotive engineering (maybe not manufacture), and Tesla are at the cutting edge of this. I think they will ultimately become a technology suppier rather than a car supplier, so it would have been a good start to lead the development of the technology.

    But. Brexit.

    Malvern Rider
    Free Member

    has to get before the brexit deniers admit they might have got it wrong?

    Have you never read the Mail/Express/Youtube comments/spoken to any friends who hold those views?

    If we leave (or don’t leave) with:
    1. No deal
    2.‘Bad’ deal
    3.‘Good’ deal

    If we

    1. Thrive
    2. Fall
    3. Renege and ask for help

    Then whatever, it’s all (and always will be) ‘the EU’s fault’ (and all of the foreigner-loving leftists and those job-stealing, benefit-claiming, economy-wrecking foreigners)

    The whole mindset is predicated on blaming ‘the Other’ and never objectively examining the facts. Being wrong is not an option. It just isn’t.

    cakeandcheese
    Full Member

    “Which country gives the best deal” is not (well, should not be) an argument in Europe, as State Aid controls subsidy to 20% (JLR’s 125mil from Hungary raised eyebrows, but has since been declared legit). The content of the 20% is often the differentiating factor – types of finance, timing of support to help business plans, de-risking activity etc.

    I’m an engineer and fully support other engineers (and doctors, financiers and other professionals) getting out of the UK for a while. If you have the skills there are endless opportunities elsewhere, in far nicer places to live.

    In the mean time, leave the Brexit loons to earn a crust from selling freedom fish to India.

    mrmo
    Free Member

    Don’t worry there’s still JLR (owned by TATA this week) which will no doubt eventually end up just sticking EV kit from other companies (such as Tesla) in an overpriced Chassis…

    https://www.jaguarlandrovercareers.com/content/Ireland/?locale=en_GB

    i wouldn’t guarantee JLR are going to be around for the longterm.

    mrmo
    Free Member

    But when it comes to the mid-career “bums on seats” type engineers,

    Or your skill set is no longer relevant, the only constant is change and if you don’t adapt you are no longer employable.

    I know of an accountant who refused to use a PC and stuck to paper, he was made redundant. I know a few software coders who were good, but there skills are too niche these days?

    So yes there is an element of cost, but there is also an element of refusing to move with the times. Now should employers invest in training for their staff to keep them upto date…..

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