Another Red Riposte - Letter to the Crewe Chronicle 10/7/14
In his recent letter, Labour PPC Dr Adrian Heald claimed
that EU Membership was important for UK Manufacturing. Once again, he has
demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of both Economics and
Manufacturing. As a Chartered Engineer, engaged in manufacturing for the entirety
of my working life, I will explain why, with fact and figures, he is totally wrong.
Dr. Heald infers that if the UK were not a member of the EU,
manufacturers would not be able to sell products into this market. This is
nonsense. The UK would remain within the EEA (the European Economic Area) and
rejoin EFTA (the European Free Trade Area), giving full access to this market.
The UK currently has a trade deficit of around £60bn per
annum with the rest of the EU. We are the EU’s biggest export market. Hence,
the imposition of anything other than a Free Trade Agreement post UK-exit would
actually hurt the EU more and is
hence extremely unlikely.
He quoted the EEF and CBI. These are the people that
predicted a disaster for the UK if we didn’t
join the Single Currency back in 1999.
The EU ‘green’ taxes levied on our energy make it extremely
difficult for heavy industries to operate here, causing most to relocate to emerging
economies, where energy is produced from the dirtiest coal-fired power stations,
as opposed to the relatively clean gas we burn here in the UK.
The EU provides grants (from our taxes) for companies here
in the UK to move their manufacturing to Eastern Europe, costing thousands of
jobs. The huge amount of unnecessary regulation imposed on UK Manufacturers
makes it uncompetitive to operate here, compared with economies outside the EU.
The high-tech manufacturing sector has a terrible
skills-shortage, which holds us back. The skilled and qualified engineers we
need, from India, China, the US, etc. are discriminated against and deterred
from coming here because of the unfair EU immigration policy the government has
adopted.
The restrictive and complex tendering rules for large,
public projects with which the UK is forced to comply are rarely adhered to on
the continent, where almost every train, ambulance and police car is
manufactured in those states. This has caused the near disappearance of our Rail
Industry.
In 2005, the EU banned the UK government from extending a
credit line to MG-Rover to help it find a buyer before it fell into
receivership, at the cost of 6,000 jobs. In 2013, the French Government pumped
around €5bn in to Renault, completely unchallenged, and continues to do so.
Of all the major world economies, only the EU, held back by
over-regulation and the disaster of the Euro, has a shrinking share of global GDP. As part of this protectionist block,
the UK is deterred from trading with growth economies around the world. The UK
currently exports more to Ireland and Belgium than it does to China. The EU
actively bans the UK from entering
into Trade Agreements of our own with these new, global economic powerhouses.
By leaving the EU, we can return to being an outward
looking, internationalist trading country, and trade with our natural markets, all around the world.
The truth is that the EU is a massive hindrance to British
Industry. Please don’t be taken in by the uninformed, unreasoned scare stories
of people like Dr. Adrian Heald. Just consider the facts and figures for
yourself.
Cllr. Stuart Hutton CEng (UKIP Crewe and Nantwich).
