This is a travesty...!!!

Marley Farley · Sep 17, 2012

I have already written to my MP, if any of you feel strongly enough about this perhaps you could too..... I think we should start to lobby our MPs that we are not happy with what is being done..!!

The proposed merger of BAE Systems and the Franco German company EADS is a travesty. 63 % would be owned by EADS. This would put our main defence manufacturer in the hands of a foreign power. Our power supplier is already in the hands of a foreign power. Do we never learn from the past? Do you see any other European country or USA or Japan or China allowing this? NO! Why! Cos it is lunacy! Call me xenophobic or even paranoid but it doesn't mean I'm wrong to doubt the future intentions of countries (politicians) that have not really shown the love to UK over the last few years. Are we wrong to want to maintain our sovereignty and independence? It is bad enough with the UK government interfering and telling us what to do without thinking an unelected European overlord would be an improvement. Yes - UNELECTED!!! The Commissionars are unelected. Look at Greece and Italy - European interference has put Unelected officials in charge of both countries. Where is the accountability. it must begin at home. Our UK elected parliament must block this move - NOW!!! Kill it off before the consultants make a fortune telling us it would be a good thing!! Don't be taken in by the hype about American competition.. Red herring!!! At least their competition is American owned. Spread the word, lobby your MP It is so wrong. Please support this!!!
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pete · Sep 17, 2012

Ah so, its not quite how I heard it on the news.
They just said a "merger", sounds more like a "take over".

Marley Farley · Sep 17, 2012

Seems like it to me Pete.. This I think is so wrong.! Soon we will be owned by everyone but ourselves..!! Frightening thought if they really start calling the tune.... If anythig happened to this country now we would be held to ransome by so many other countries..... Our recent governments have sold us out to every other country..!!!
Did you read this by Alex Brummer.? Sums it up very well I think..!

the price we’re all paying in higher bills for having sold off half our companies to foreign owners. Here, in the second extract from his devastating new book, he warns that with so much of our vital utility companies in foreign hands, we are now at the mercy of conglomerates that could bring Britain Plc to a shuddering halt .
Everyone feels it’s their right to have water when they turn on a tap — just as we all assume a flick of a switch will produce light.
These are public services we take for granted. We also expect our airports to function properly and care homes to treat the elderly with respect.
True, most are now owned by private companies, but we tend to assume the public interest always comes first — such as plugging leaks and renewing water pipes, rather than providing fat profits for shareholders.
But what happens when most of Britain’s essential public services are no longer run by the British? It’s a crucial question that politicians dodge, as one company after another is sold off to foreign masters.
Roughly half of all our essential services — from water to bridges and ports — now have overseas owners. And in many cases, there’s disturbing evidence to suggest the public is losing out — and will continue to do so.

Why? Because not only are foreign companies out to make fat profits as speedily as possible, but they’re not as concerned as a British company would be about public opinion. They owe no particular allegiance to this country, and their foreign fortresses shield them from our bitter complaints.
Take Scottish Power, now owned by Spanish firm Iberdrola. Last year, after a series of price increases, it announced its customers would have to pay yet more for their gas. Scottish consumers were furious: in five years, their energy bills had risen by an average of 40 per cent.
So you can imagine the reaction when, just weeks after the latest hike, it emerged that Scottish Power had piled up vast profits. So much so, that it had made an £800 million loan to a sister company in the U.S.
This was not illegal. A utility company with an international reach can transfer profits from one part of the world to another rather than reinvest them in infrastructure, service and lower prices in the host country.
Among the critics of Iberdrola was Glasgow MP John Robertson, who said: ‘It seems beyond the pale to be hiking prices in the UK when the company has lent £800 million. It’s in no one’s interest to have energy companies milking the British consumer at a time when households are struggling to make ends meet.’
Struggling British consumers had to swallow the increase. Not so in America, where Iberdrola also supplies gas and electricity. Its consumers there had gas and electricity bills frozen since the mid-Nineties, until relatively modest rises last year of between four and eight per cent.

So how come Iberdrola — through Scottish Power — hikes up bills in Britain while keeping them at a reasonable level in the U.S.? It’s because different states and cities in America retain strict controls not only over gas and electricity prices, but how much the companies should reinvest into their business.
When UK firm National Grid bought several energy companies on the East coast of America, it discovered that any proposed price increase was subject to public hearings in which all interested groups have their say.
And each state demanded full financial disclosure — such as details of the salaries, perks and lifestyles of company executives. Investigations by the New York Public Service Commission of National Grid’s operations in the state found it had potentially over-charged expenses of $26 million.
The result is that in New York and other states, National Grid has been knocked back in its efforts to force through price increases. No wonder foreign companies flock to Britain and generally give the U.S. a wide berth.
Ironically, the first wave of new owners after British power companies were privatised were chiefly Americans. Attracted by the lack of regulations, they saw an opportunity to make easy profits and ship them home. They brought with them U.S.-style remuneration packages for directors which turned many into ‘fat cats’ overnight. The pay of the highest-paid water company executives soared by between 50 per cent and 200 per cent.
And we paid, through rising prices.
In the UK, we’ve ended up with the worst of all worlds: overseas ownership and no real accountability or constraint on price rises. Increases are frequent and apparently arbitrary —and push up overall levels of inflation.

Unlike its U.S. counterparts, our energy regulator, Ofgem, has only limited powers in its battle against absentee landlords.
The head of Ofgem, Alistair Buchanan, a former City analyst, says one of his principal concerns is that foreign-owned utilities have a record of instantly passing on price increases to UK consumers when oil and gas prices are rising, but failing to adjust them downwards fast enough — if at all — when wholesale prices are falling.
Another concern is that our power bills are likely to soar even higher when old plant and equipment come to the end of their effective life. Foreign owners tend to have more compelling uses for their cash than building up investments for our future.
Yet, ironically, it was the urgent need for investment that helped make such a good case for privatising Britain’s water companies in 1995. Far better, thought the Government then, to get our Victorian pipes and sewage systems replaced by private companies.
One of the jewels in the crown was Thames Water, with 8.5 million water customers, 100 water treatment plants, 290 pumping stations and 235 reservoirs. In 2001, it was snapped up by Germany’s RWE, one of Europe’s largest power utilities.

By 2005, Thames profits had soared by 30 per cent to £346 million — helped by a 21 per cent price rise for customers approved by the notoriously useless regulator, Ofwat. Yet that same year, the company’s pipes were in such a bad state of repair they were leaking 196 million gallons a day.
The German owners did little to address the problem. This became a scandal in the serious drought of 2006, when customers were banned from watering lawns and washing cars.
The Daily Mail revealed that the five men controlling Britain’s most wasteful water company were paid £20 million a year. And while the average Thames customer’s bill was £265 a year, residents of the chief executive’s hometown — Laren in Germany — paid well under half that amount for a first-class modern network.
The ghastly publicity forced Philip Fletcher, director-general of Ofwat — until then ineffectual — to confront the issue. Describing the situation as ‘totally unacceptable’ and pointing out that the water leaked from Thames Water’s pipes could supply 2.8 million homes each day, he accused the company of profiteering.
The failure of Thames to curb leakages had contributed to water shortages in the South, he added, and could increase the need for hosepipe bans and other restrictions in future years.
Taken aback, the German owners bailed out and sold the company. They did not leave empty-handed: over their five years of ownership, the company paid £1 billion in dividends to its mainly German shareholders, including a final payment of £216 million.
The new, foreign, owner, was Kemble Water, controlled by Australian infrastructure fund Macquarie. Immediately, it started selling off some of Thames’s assets — including South East Water.

Overall, however, the foreign-owned water companies have shown far more interest in profits than improving the reliability and quality of our water supplies and sewerage disposal.
This method of doing business is not exclusive to them, either.
Remember December 2010, when Britain shivered for days under inches of snow? Unlike other big European airports, Heathrow turned into something akin to a Third World refugee camp as it closed for 48 hours.
The British Airports Authority — owned by the Spanish company Ferrovial — had under-invested in snow-clearing equipment. In buying BAA, Ferrovial had lamentably over-extended itself with debt. Despite some improvements since, our leading airport remains a poor cousin to many of its European counterparts.
And there are other grounds for alarm. By a strange quirk, several of the latest foreign owners of British utilities are state-controlled. So nationalised companies privatised only a few years ago are effectively in state hands again — though the state is no longer Britain.
London Electricity, bought by U.S. firm Entergy in 1996 for £1.3 billion, was sold two years later to French state-owned EDF for £1.9 billion. EDF later snapped up two small nearby power distributors and merged them into a new company, EDF Energy. In 2009, it won control of Britain’s nuclear power generators, which means that they’re effectively owned by the state of France.
Three years before — as other nations started to invest heavily in nuclear energy — we’d sold another prime nuclear company, Westinghouse, to the Japanese.!!!
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I could go on & on but won't but this country is in such a mess & no sign of anyone putting the brakes on & trying to get this country' industries back.!!
Sorry will get off my soap box now....
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pete · Sep 17, 2012

Cant admit to reading it all Marley, but it s the kind of thing I've often thought was happening.
The government consider it a real deal, every time some foreign company "invests" in UK companies, and brags about how good it is that foreign company's want to invest here.

Marley Farley · Sep 17, 2012

"Invests" seems to be a word we & the government have different understandings & meanings of.. This is why I feel enough is enough & am lobbying my MP along with others & asking for some answers & to stop selling us off.!!

HYDROGEN86 · Sep 18, 2012

Hi Marley,
From what i have read and if i have misunderstood im sure somebody will correct me, if this does go through we will own over 40% of the worlds largest weapons company, as appose to france and Germany who will only own 22.5%, surely that is good thing for us? And also we are all friends in europe now, well mostly WW2 was a long time ago and any future wars are lkely to be with islamic countries in the middle/far east. France, German and Britain ect are going to be allies as we are mainly christian nations so does it not make sense to share our resources and knowledge and all work together??

Who owns BEA though?? Can EADA only sell weapons to europian countries? I just seen something about a Dubai company that owns a large share in EADA surely thats not good?? If i knew that EADA could only be owned by europian nations or companies and only sell weapons to to europian countries i would be all for it but its a very complex matter i have tried to do a bit of research before posting but im even more confused now

"M" · Sep 18, 2012

pete said: ↑
Cant admit to reading it all Marley, but it s the kind of thing I've often thought was happening.
The government consider it a real deal, every time some foreign company "invests" in UK companies, and brags about how good it is that foreign company's want to invest here.
Click to expand...

It creates jobs; we live in a Global economony and could not survive without foreign investment. Likewise, the UK invests in industries in other countries; it's swings and roundabouts really. Nothing is going to change that.

clueless1 · Sep 18, 2012

HYDROGEN86 said: ↑
Hi Marley,
From what i have read and if i have misunderstood im sure somebody will correct me, if this does go through we will own over 40% of the worlds largest weapons company, as appose to france and Germany who will only own 22.5%, surely that is good thing for us? And also we are all friends in europe now, well mostly WW2 was a long time ago and any future wars are lkely to be with islamic countries in the middle/far east. France, German and Britain ect are going to be allies as we are mainly christian nations so does it not make sense to share our resources and knowledge and all work together??
Click to expand...

Britains next major war will not be with an Islamic state. It will be with Argentina. When that happens, the best we can hope for is that we'll be on our own, because nobody is keen to help us with it. The worst case scenario is likely to be that certain 'allies' will apply 'non-violent pressure' on Britain at the same time. That will include certain European 'allies' that, for example, have an allegiance with Argentina and who are a bit upset with us for not given them their rock back.

Jack McHammocklashing · Sep 18, 2012

There will be no war with Argentina
The UK can not support one, we have no ships, or aircraft carriers, or aircraft to land on them if we had
As for the Falklands, If Argentina decide to take them they are theirs, I will not state how many troops we have there, though we do have four aircraft left there, and serviced monthly from the 82 conflict

Jack McH

Jack McHammocklashing · Sep 18, 2012

HYDROGEN86 said: ↑
Hi Marley,
From what i have read and if i have misunderstood im sure somebody will correct me, if this does go through we will own over 40% of the worlds largest weapons company, as appose to france and Germany who will only own 22.5%, surely that is good thing for us? And also we are all friends in europe now, well mostly WW2 was a long time ago and any future wars are lkely to be with islamic countries in the middle/far east. France, German and Britain ect are going to be allies as we are mainly christian nations so does it not make sense to share our resources and knowledge and all work together??

Who owns BEA though?? Can EADA only sell weapons to europian countries? I just seen something about a Dubai company that owns a large share in EADA surely thats not good?? If i knew that EADA could only be owned by europian nations or companies and only sell weapons to to europian countries i would be all for it but its a very complex matter i have tried to do a bit of research before posting but im even more confused now
Click to expand...

Oh dear :-(

They buy out, and take ALL our technical knowledge, then shut the UK factories down. we then have nothing, just like when they bought out Rover and Jaguar

We can build no ships.
We produce nothing
We only produce cars under licence, in typical Japanese concentration camp work shops
(a continuous moving belt that the worker can not leave, even for the toilet, the same as in call centres, you need the toilet, you have to swipe your card to leave and are allowed four minutes, more than once a day and your job is on the line, more than three times in a one month period you are dismissed, not redundant not sacked dismissed, and as it is YOUR FAULT you do not get benefits for six months)

Way to go 40% of nothing is NOTHING

Jack McH

clueless1 · Sep 18, 2012

My mate lives and works down in Portsmouth. He said the locals are really proud of the new aircraft carrier that they're building down there at minute.

Robajobs · Sep 18, 2012

I was particularly interested in Brummers take on Thames water!!!

HYDROGEN86 · Sep 18, 2012

Jack McHammocklashing said: ↑
Oh dear :-(

They buy out, and take ALL our technical knowledge, then shut the UK factories down. we then have nothing, just like when they bought out Rover and Jaguar

We can build no ships.
We produce nothing
We only produce cars under licence, in typical Japanese concentration camp work shops
(a continuous moving belt that the worker can not leave, even for the toilet, the same as in call centres, you need the toilet, you have to swipe your card to leave and are allowed four minutes, more than once a day and your job is on the line, more than three times in a one month period you are dismissed, not redundant not sacked dismissed, and as it is YOUR FAULT you do not get benefits for six months)

Way to go 40% of nothing is NOTHING

Jack McH
Click to expand...

Oh i dont know i knew i should not have got involved in this one!

Regarding war with Argentina though, we have HMS Dauntless down there, and im sure we still have stealth bombers, apache helicopters and eurofighters, cruise missiles and if they still wont take NO for an answer we can nuke em!!

"M" · Sep 18, 2012

Jack McHammocklashing said: ↑
....
They buy out, and take ALL our technical knowledge, then shut the UK factories down. we then have nothing, just like when they bought out Rover and Jaguar

.....
We produce nothing
.....
Click to expand...

Sweeping statements, Jack. *If* foreign investors "take ALL our technical knowledge", then the argument must hold that we do the same when we invest overseas It's dog eat dog out there and we are as culpable as those who invest here!

Do research what the UK *does* produce/manufacture ... because we still do! Perhaps not in the "old style" production days (cotton mills, mining), but, we are still good to go on the manufacturing front.

clueless1 · Sep 19, 2012

In the last 3 years, right on my doorstep (well, ok, a few roads away) we've seen 1 brand new £300 Million bio-ethanol plant built and up and running. British owned. The steel works over the road restarted, Thai owned now but employing the local lads. And its just been on the news about a new manufacturing plant just on the other side of the Tees.

Add to that the contract that's just been awarded to a firm in Northallerton to build trains, granted its for a multinational consortium but it will employ local lads and lasses. Our area is doing ok out of manufacturing.

These companies and many more like them can happen for only one reason. We have the expertise to make it happen.

Although I'm not sure I like the trend of merging with our European neighbours on defence stuff (it was a travesty when the last government announced that we were merging our Royal Navy capability with that of the french), at present I wouldn't be too worried. I happen to know that there is a very large defence firm very much under British ownership, yet not quite as well known as BAE.

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This is a travesty...!!!

Marley Farley Affable Admin! Staff Member

pete Growing a bit of this and a bit of that....

Marley Farley Affable Admin! Staff Member

pete Growing a bit of this and a bit of that....

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"M" Total Gardener

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Robajobs I ♥ Organic manure and fine Iranian lagers

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Another travesty of justice

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This is a travesty...!!!

Marley Farley Affable Admin! Staff Member

pete Growing a bit of this and a bit of that....

Marley Farley Affable Admin! Staff Member

pete Growing a bit of this and a bit of that....

Marley Farley Affable Admin! Staff Member

HYDROGEN86 Head Gardener

"M" Total Gardener

clueless1 member... yep, that's what I am:)

Jack McHammocklashing Sludgemariner

Jack McHammocklashing Sludgemariner

clueless1 member... yep, that's what I am:)

Robajobs I ♥ Organic manure and fine Iranian lagers

HYDROGEN86 Head Gardener

"M" Total Gardener

clueless1 member... yep, that's what I am:)

Another travesty of justice

A travesty of justice

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