Warehouse space for Chinese goods

Thanks, but i assure that this isnt a wind-up, we are (like everybody else i suppose), interested in seeing if there is a money making opportunity here. With British manufacturing Industry virtually committing suicide by the day, i suspect there is opening up a huge importation opportunity here.
What worries us, is that with the shortages of the needed warehouse space, things are going to get tough and it might mean British industry actually becoming more cost effective...specially if the pound plummets after brexit.
Another thing..
Obviously no private UK industry is going to hire out warehouse space so that their competitors may use it…they would just use it themselves…this would create a monopoly on "importation middle-manning" into UK. In the worst case, the British Government could swoop in and see the money making opportunity here…..the British government might buy up loads of warehouse space and start a "middle-man-imports-from-China" business…..and start making revenue from it…instead of people like our company. This would be bad for us. Is this likely to ever happen? We would hope not.....at least not until we've made a decent profit out of it beforehand , all for ourselves.

After all, do you see the way the British government makes money out of traffic cams and parking fees?...not to mention the 50% tax rate on earnings over £30000/yr.......literally feverish money making…..we genuinely fear that if we start up an “import-from-china business”, then the Brit government may start taxing it so heavily that it isnt worth doing….or, as I discussed, the Brit government may actually start doing the middle man stuff itself…after all…what do you need to be a middle man?.......a comfy office chair and a phone and an internet connection….and a liking for counting money into your bank account…..the Brit government (Civil service) could do that all day long.

Its an enormous mystery why they don't do it now.....after all...the Brit governemnt are fervent money grabbers.....look at UK train fares......look at the traffic cam revenue in UK.....who hasnt been done by a traffic cam?........i had a right old banger of a Pug106.....never drove out of the motorway slow lane...but even i got traffic cammed....£60 and 3 points......it was in Luton town centre and i swear i never got above 5mph because of the gridlock...but the Brit Government still had me over for it.

Why doesnt the Brit government get into the "middle man from China" business?

Considering we have a considerable and growing manufacturing base in this country the idea that it is committing suicide by the day appears to be … wrong.

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Sorry, but au contraire....

In the early 1950s, the UK was an industrial giant. Today, it is an industrial pygmy. In 1952, UK owned companies made a quarter of the world’s manufacturing exports. Today (2018), the UK makes up less than 2 per cent of the world’s manufacturing exports, and even that percentage is mostly made up from foreign owned companies operating within the UK.

The UK now has a National Debt of 1.9 trillion pounds, and has been spending much more than it earns for every year over the 35 years up to 2018, and its trade deficit is dramatically worsening. UK's interest payments for its National Debt costs £48 billion per year (the NHS costs UK £116 billion per year). The supply of North Sea Oil on which UK has become reliant is about to run out. >50% of UK industry is foreign owned; >40% of UK vital services (electricity, gas, infrastructure etc) are foreign owned; >66% of the fuel for the UK economy is foreign owned. UK is not capable of building its own nuclear power stations but relies on China to do it whilst China is already busy building islands just off the coasts of Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Phillipines. >90% of UK schoolchildren stop progressing in maths & science at the age of 16. The OECD recently declared that a quarter of UK’s adults have the maths skills of a 10 year old. The brunt of the UK’s Naval fleet is powered by Electric Motors & Drives designed and built by the French. In the UK in 2016, >70% of London’s ‘zone 1’ office space is foreign owned.

The UK’s downward slide is moving at an alarming pace....In 1952, the UK was an industrial powerhouse. In 1952, UK brought out the world’s first commercial airliner, and was a close second to the USA in the development of the computer. In 1956, UK was amongst the first to bring out a Nuclear power station. In the 1950’s, Britain invented nuclear power, led the world in its application and developed enough stations to sustain a sizeable home-grown industry with a strong skills base. In the 1950s, UK owned companies were the second-largest manufacturers of cars in the world (after the United States) and the world’s largest exporter of cars.

The UK’s Sir Frank Whittle invented the turbojet engine in the 1930’s. In 1940, the UK had developed a Cavity Magnetron a thousand times more powerful than anything in the USA. The Mini, as developed by the British Motor Corporation in the 1960’s was voted the 2nd most influential car of the 20th century.

However, the UK flogged most of Rolls Royce to the Germans, Jaguar Land Rover to India, Bentley to the Germans, Rover to the Germans, Triumph to the Germans, and now has virtually no car industry of its own (Morgan cars have BMW engines). The UK has 25.8 million cars on its roads, and each one represents lots of money flowing overseas, worsening the already disastrous UK trade deficit. The UK cannot blame the arrival of the Far East into the world economy for UK’s poor performance, because after all Germany is managing just fine. In 2014, Germany was the world’s biggest exporter by Capital value.

The UK privatised its rail network so as to bring the benefits of private ownership...but then the German government bought a huge chunk of it (Arriva trains)...so its back into state-ownership...but owned by the state of a foreign country. In December 2015, the UK derived 17% of its energy from wind power. In Oct 2016, there were 6594 wind turbines in the UK. None of these wind turbines is designed or manufactured in the UK. Virtually all of them are designed and manufactured by Siemens of Germany or other foreign companies.



The UK payed £4.4bn net to the EU in 2009/10, but this rose to £8.8bn in 2014/15....the EU actually took 12.8 billion from UK, but gave back £4bn to be spent in ways decided entirely by the EU. The UK recently flogged off Admiralty Arch (the glorious gateway to Buckingham Palace) and The Old War Office (on Whitehall) to Spain & India respectively, for conversion into Hotels/Flats. In 2002, the UK came up with the "Enterprise Act", freeing its government from the duty of intervention when its own UK owned industries of great value were about to be sold into Foreign ownership...subsequently, from 1997 to 2007, foreign ownership of the UK’s firms rose from a third to a half, and foreign ownership of its vital services (electricity, gas infrastructure etc) rose to 40 per cent. Other countries (eg USA, Germany, France, Spain, India, China etc etc) have legislation which stops them from selling off their country’s prized assets in the way that the UK does.

Foreign companies acquired £30billion worth of the UK's enterprises in 2009. In 2010, that rose to a value of £54.5 billion. In 2016, the UK flogged off the magnificent ARM company to the Japanese for £24.3 billion, this had been the jewel in the UK's crown, one of the greatest electronics companies in the world. The UK flogged Boots the Chemists to the Italians, and Boots stores remain in the UK, and then the UK found that under Italian ownership, the UK received just £9 million in Tax from Boots, rather than the £90 million per year that it received before flogging it off (due to Boots getting "brass plated" by the Italians to Zug in Switzerland)......The same story of reduced Tax revenue is prevalent with most of the UK's other multitudinous industrial sales to foreign companies. In 2016, the Chief Advisor to the Turkish Prime Minister indicated that all the UK now does is to “Produce Cadbury’s chocolates and Maltesers”. (But in fact, Cadbury’s actually was sold to the Kraft foods company of the USA in 2010). In 2012, Nikolas Sarkozy, Prime Minister of France, declared that “The United Kingdom has no industry any more”. England is the 5th (fifth) most densely populated country in the world.
Between 2002 and 2008 the UK suffered a 50% drop in the number of its own domiciled school leavers opting for Electronics/Electrical Engineering degrees. Each year much less than 500 of UK school leavers "enrol" for an electronics degree, the majority of these choose all software modules or transfer to the School of Computer Science at the end of year two. In UK it is virtually impossible for almost anyone to assert the exact number of UK_citizen school leavers that end up actually graduating with an electronics degree each year....As far as Electronics Hardware centred graduates are concerned, the number is thought to be under 100 per year. A paltry amount.

When foreign owned companies in UK are a success, the profits flow overseas, when they do less well, there are more likely to be job losses. R&D spending gets notably less when UK industries get sold overseas. Tax revenue to UK is dramatically less. The UK is poorly placed to pay off its huge National Debt, since it has shed the once UK owned Engineering industry so desperately needed to pay off its debt.

The UK National Debt of UK is 1.7 trillion pounds in 2016. However, this figure is often “watered down” by expressing it as “National Debt as a percentage of GDP”. This comes out as 90% for UK…hardly a cause for comfort in itself, but in any case, GDP has dubious meaning for a country like UK, where >50% of industry & services are foreign owned. This is partly because for instance, GDP does not take into account profits earned in a nation by overseas companies that are remitted back to foreign investors. This can overstate a country's actual economic output.

Like in no other country, Britain has sold off more than half of its companies to Foreign owners (stated by Alex Brummer in book “Britain for Sale”). Nearly two thirds of UK manufacturing businesses that employ over 500 are now owned by foreign companies claimed business minister Baroness Neville-Rolfe in 2016.

Thanks, i suppose we want to know if its possible to do this (import from China business) as an individual with a few grand to spare...or do you absolutely need the backing of a huge corporation behind you?
I suppose individuals who have been sucessful in this may not want to come out in public and tell how they did it, i appreciate that.

.....I'm sure its a whole lot easier if you've got enough background finance to get ripped off a few times when youre starting up, and yet still be adequately self-financed thereafter......before you find a genuine reliable Chinese supplier...after that i am sure its plain sailing....its just getting to that stage where there is, no matter how much "homework" one has done, this inevitable leap of faith when one starts off into this middle-man-from-China thing.

We also have a slight inkling that the Chinese suppiers will pay more respect to a Big powerful UK corporation, than to a UK individual.....is it even possible for a lowly individual to succeed in this game?

I dont know of any importers who started out as individuals.

Your figures include manufacturing by foreign companies based in UK, and are therefore not that relevant. Really not that relevant at all. Quoting from my post above (post number is not displayed/displayable?)

When foreign owned companies in UK are a success, the profits flow overseas, when they do less well, there are more likely to be job losses. R&D spending gets notably less when UK industries get sold overseas. Tax revenue to UK is dramatically less. The UK is poorly placed to pay off its huge National Debt, since it has shed the once intrinsically UK owned Engineering industry so desperately needed to pay off its debt.

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Do you know what sort of mess Greece is in financially?
The UK's national debt is five times higher than that of greece.

Who cares who owns the companies? They are working here. Employing people here, paying local taxes here, using local facilities.

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...paying corporation tax in luxembourg.
When we run out of money, these foreign companies will just leave UK.
In 2016, >66% of uk manufacturing business's (> 500 staff ) were foreign owned....this has now increased.

A country needs its own home domiciled business to survive...foreign companies dont come to uk out of charity to uk.

And national debt, big deal

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.......The UK National Debt of UK is 1.7 trillion pounds in 2016. However, this figure is often “watered down” by expressing it as “National Debt as a percentage of GDP”. This comes out as 90% for UK…hardly a cause for comfort in itself, but in any case, GDP has dubious meaning for a country like UK, where >50% of industry & services are foreign owned. This is partly because for instance, GDP does not take into account profits earned in a nation by overseas companies that are remitted back to foreign investors. This can overstate a country's actual economic output.
The UK is poorly placed to pay off its huge National Debt, since it has shed the once UK owned Engineering industry so desperately needed to pay off its debt.

The most wealthy countries, with the best standard of living across the board, have far more home owned industry than UK.
This is because Its important to have home owned industry. It makes more money for the country than foreign owned industry.

In the UK at the moment, if you look at big uk owned companies that do there own electrics/electronics design and manufac, then we are now down to these..

Dyson
Rolls royce marine
Rolls royce aerospace
JCB
BAE

...thats about it...and BAE gets foreign companies to do most of its work.

In germany they have huge Gov funding for middle sized engineering industry from the mittelstandsbank (for german owned industry only..not for non german owned industry)...this is why germany is so far ahead of uk....if this funding was not in place, then big german companies would do down their smaller rivals..so the german state moves in and levels the playing field.
Look at germany if you want to see how industry should be done.

But there is more to it than this…in Germany they have a different ethos in their industry. -A superior one...

A german worker or boss goes to work first for Germany, second for themselves….and just look how successful this makes Germany and this feeds through to all its companies…in UK, we go to work first for ourselves…and second…for ourselves…etc etc
But there is more...
When a chief engineer at VW wants to go to work at BMW instead , all the staff at VW including the boss of VW, salute the staff member who is leaving…because they know that that worker will still be working for germany

So if you want UK owned industry then buy it.

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Buy it...well yes, best is to develop Engineering talent in the UK and then develop UK owned engineering companies from the ground up.

Here is how to do this......
___________________________________________________________________
Dear Member of Parliament,

Please help implement the following changes to stop the United Kingdom (UK) becoming a Third World country within the next decade.

The following explains the terrible state that United Kingdom is in..

[website name deleted]...but its contents are as in post above (5th post down)

Please help rescue the United Kingdom Engineering industry (& hence the United Kingdom) by doing the following..


*******************************************************
1..Regularly tell all UK Schoolkids (8-16yrs) that the UK will be a Third World country within a decade unless the UK Engineering industry is rescued. (repeat this every month to the kids).
Regularly point the kids to this website….
[website name deleted]...but its contents are as in post above (5th post down)

2a…Regularly tell all UK Schoolkids (8-16yrs) that they can prevent the UK from falling into the Third World by studying Maths/Science/Engineering subjects. Especially A Level Maths. Engineering jobs can be very rewarding & enjoyable.

2b..Regularly tell all UK Schoolkids that if the UK Engineering industry is not rescued, then the UK economy will die and there will be few if any reasonably payed jobs to go for.

2c…Give all the UK Schoolkids/College students my Free Switch Mode Power Supply course, which can help them become a Power Supply Designer/Worker. This course is fun and gives them the “Tricks of the Trade” rather than being self-righteously academic. [email deleted]. Other Engineers can make other similar free courses for the UK schoolkids/College students.

3….Bring in “Service Schools” in UK. These will be just like the old Grammar Schools, but have a “Service to UK” ethos. The “Service School” kids will respond well to the call to take up Engineering/Maths/Science subjects and then grow up and save the UK Engineering industry. Less fortunate kids will then be able to benefit from jobs in a resulting rejuvinated Engineering Industry. The state-school kids will still receive a ‘top of the range’ education, which will still allow them to go on to great things if they wish. The dramatic decline in UK industry since 1952 has followed the decline in Grammar school numbers.

4......British government owned industries must be set up in all the basic areas of Engineering. (eg Lighting, domestic goods, various industrial machinery etc etc). This is to provide engineering work for British domiciles, and incentivise British children that Engineering jobs are going to be available in UK.

The following website shows the rationale behind this....
[website name deleted]

Tariffs must be placed on all non-UK goods comprising electronics so as to help start this industry off in UK. The tariffs could be avoided only if

the British Government itself brings the products in. Even 'components' like populated electronics circuit boards must be tariffed.

Electronics companys use Technical knowledge, but also there is a need for vast amounts of "Trivial Engineering Knowledge" (eg how to best do ‘thermal vias in pads’, what types of thermal glue are best, how to best design ESD flooring, how to set solder resist boundaries, etc etc etc…). The basic Government run electronics industries would share this knowledge with each other, and thus be very successful….this is the secret of China’s success in basic electronics such as lighting, basic domestic goods, etc......ie, sharing of knowledge so that time is not wasted making mistakes due to the lack of the "Trivial Engineering Knowledge".

The spin-offs of these protected industries will be massively beneficial to Britain. Some Engineering Staff could leave these Government companies and join other more private British companies such as Dyson etc, or set up their own companies, having gained valuable experience in the Government run industry.

The following website offers tips on ways of sucessfully running such protected UK industries....
[website name deleted]

5.....A "training company" should be set up to train people up in Switch Mode Power Supply Design. This would produce real products but

under a training ethos. The training should be centred on my free Switch Mode Power Supply Course (details above). The course would be used by Engineers wanting to get trained up. Also would be for use by Electronics degree/HND/BTEC students who wish to get practical

experience in summer vacation. Power Supplies exist in virtually all electronics products, so this is a good area for the course. Similar courses could be set up in say software, etc etc.

*************** Also, the following sub-points *****************

A….More public funding for UK Engineering companies, like the funding given by the German “KfW Mittelstandsbank “ to German small/medium companies.

B…The new T-level qualifications for UK schoolkids, must work towards having British owned companies (such as Dyson etc) on their advisory boards, not, as is currently the case, where the vast majority of the companies overseeing the UK’s T level courses are non British. The T levels appear to be Non-British companys' ideas about what the UK's education system should do. This looks highly regrettable.

C…..Other improvements including implementing “Open Workplaces” (How to run certain Electronics companies), Stopping the sell-off of UK industrys to Foreign buyers, Assistance with funding for UK Engineering courses, and other details as described in this website…..
[website name deleted]

D….UK Engineers (even retired ones) must be encouraged to go into UK Colleges/Universities where Engineering subjects are being studied. They can offer insight & encouragement into the trade. This is much-needed as the actual job isn’t necessarily as difficult as its made out to be. Especially with University Courses which first and foremost are heavily centred towards nurturing the World’s next leading scientific pioneers, rather than creating more General Engineering Staff.

E......Financial assistance should be made available for British Engineering companies that are already located in the South of UK to expand (where possible) in the South of UK (unless they want to move to the North). Currently, British companies in the South of UK can often not receive government grant money for expansion in the South of UK, because property is much cheaper in North UK, so the Government grant is always given on the basis of the company moving to North of UK. However, often, the British company in question then does not want to relocate to the North, and so they just sell the company into Foreign hands instead. This is not good. The money needed to facilitate this could be gotten from taxation on property owners who own more than 20 properties.

If you want to see the whole "Revive British Industry" website, then type "wixsite revive" into google , and you will get to it.
This is the first version of our website, written by our secretary, Alan Massey, who recently joined us.
This is not yet complete, but the majority of it is there.

We regularly meet in London, and are growing fast.

The Revive British Industry campaign has been going for 10 years, but has been ignored by all, and most of the longest members are busy and some too old to get into proper website design.

If you want the UK government interfering in schools then do not start with your ideology. Perhaps stick to facts.

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Thanks, intersting point, but may i ask to what ideology and facts you refer?