Sky reporting that Honda Plant may close

[SoloD]

Not confirmed by Honda as yet but no denial.

3500 jobs at risk and many more in the supply chain. Heart goes out to those involved, but they are highly skilled workers so let hope if this is the case they will find new jobs quickly.

There does seem to be a pattern emerging. Vital investment in the UK automotive sector has dropped 76% since the vote, despite government funding to prop up the sector.

We were told this was project fear, well it turns out it's project reality. I fear Honda won't be the last, Ford and Mini have both said they will pull out if there is a Hard Deal Brexit.

I heard this today, honda factory going is one thing I did not see coming, my heart goes out to the families involved. I know staff there and I'm worried for them. It was very shitty for news company to break story before the associates were told.

Coxwell

This was the line from an arch-Brexiteer in 2015:

twitter.com/DanielJHannan/status/644428141302255616

Those that do not want to admit it, will never blame Brexit. They will blame EU for their crap deal or the government likewise, never bloody Brexit, always something else.

Awful news.
Is it correct that they are moving all EU and Turkey car production back to Japan?

The area I live in is very much "leave" and it boils my piss. There is an area FB page where the few remainers post things like this and other bits and bobs and all they can say is "the remoaners are always blaming Brexit". Well yes!

Old Milly's All-Manic:

I said this would happen. I said Ford in Bridgend would close. I said Toyota and Nissan would scale down investment and eventually pull out in about a decade. I said Airbus would take its new contracts to other plants and eventually close Broughton.

I was told I was Remoaning Project Fear.

More from Leavers who told us there would be no problems:

twitter.com/LeaveEUOfficial/status/1042393177389506560

People are still making feeble excuses saying it's not brexit that's causing these awful job losses and I got into a spat about it today with some people in the village shop, I ended up stropping out shouting it's not your feckin jobs being lost is it but you don't care as long as it's somebody else's.

Grrrrr

Coxwell very sorry about the Honda news💐

It doesn't seem to be a Brexit decision, because they are moving manufacture to Japan, not to somewhere in the EU.

There are commentators pinning it to global downturn, and for this one (not others) I think they have a point.

It doesn't seem to be a Brexit decision, because they are moving manufacture to Japan, not to somewhere in the EU.

Nothing at all to do with the EU, no. Nothing to do with disruption to JIT, for example. Nothing to do with that lovely tariff-free Japan-EU Trade Deal that we won’t be part of.

Problem is that even if by some miracle we don’t Brexit now it’s too late, I doubt all these companies leaving would stay anyway

Honda moving back to Japan so it can trade tariff free with the EU.

Nothing to do with Brexit though. Nothing at all. The MP said so.

According to the local MP it has nothing to do with Brexit. Yeah sure it's a massive consequenced. Just like my husband company decision to move it's headquarters to Ireland. The bexiters have been saying that industry are planning for a no deal Brexit. They just won't admit that some of the plans mean working out ways to remain within the EU.

The EU country Honda has its car plants in is the UK.
The UK is leaving EU and will not be able to guarantee tariff free trade due to ERG pushing hard Brexit.
EU has signed tariff free trade deal with Japan.
Honda can now move cars freely from Japan to EU but not from UK to EU.
Honda makes shock announcement it is closing UK plant.

Brexit isn't the only issue Honda faces, over production, drop in diesel demand etc but it seems highly unlikely it didn't play a role in terms of tariffs, JIT parts and currency fluctuations.

Toyota, Mini and Ford have warned that hard Brexit will mean that they will close their UK plants
www.theguardian.com/business/2018/oct/02/toyota-hard-brexit-uk-plant-bmw-mini-jaguar-land-rover

I don't want one of these MPs pretending this is not Brexit related.

We deserve better than this s__t show.

We deserve better than this shit show No we don't. The majority voted to come out. The biggest act of en masse insanity ever.

This country will be little more than a museum in ten years.

This country will be little more than a museum in ten years

People want to visit museums.

I'm picturing more a "Zimbabwe of Europe" vibe.

@autumncrow I was talking to my son today, Coxwell, he's doing a hard science degree, and I suspect he's already looking towards the Netherlands.

Why? Not every business is going to up and leave.

@origamiunicorn

No, not by a long way, but industries tend to cluster (look at Banks in the City of London for example). If you are interested in a particular career, then you may have to consider your options outside the UK.

Car manufacturing seems to be on the way out with Brexit. Even if we avoid the WTO tariffs there is significant increases in costs caused by customs clearance and documentation. It will be a huge loss to this country as so many jobs were in the supply chain.

Why are we talking about any businesses upping and leaving? It was all going to be a land of milk and honey, so businesses should be rushing here.

Car manufacturing seems to be on the way out with Brexit.

I suspect there's also a systemic downturn in car manufacturing anyway. I've already suggested that private car ownership in 30 years will be lower than today.

It's an industry on the edge of enormous change and massive investment in new technology: Electric cars. Driverless pods. Shared vehicles you pick up and leave like rental bikes.

Someone is going to get all that investment.

Julie Heartless-Brewer conveniently missing out the fact that the Swindon Honda factory mostly (95%) produces petrol engine cars