The British Car Industry

quite obvious to any business that saturated market means no profit for weakest at least 8 or so firms fighting over over 2 million total sales so 150 ooo cars tops for Rover .

Ah well, they you go, a learning for any future manufacture. Product Portfolio, Product Brand, Price, Customer and never cost reduce on quality.

My dad brought a cream coloured montego it was only 12 months old on the way back from the showroom it overheated he took it back the next day and paid the extra money for a Sierra and never had any problems with it

In the 1980's I used to deliver silencers to Land Rover in the Midlands and it was hard work I used to tell drivers to take a book with them, Delivering to the night shift was nt too bad untill midnight, after that it didnt happen quickly

As a Dutchman who loves the British style, design, inventions and people in general my observations:
-Poor quality
-ancient mechanics
-outdated models
-highly unmotivated workforce

Reasons:
-huge gap between hands-on workforce (grown lazy) and upper management (complete silver spoon idiots)
This class difference results in hate between the classes.
-Unhealthy nationalistic pride in Great Britain, thus never taking the competition serious. We know what’s best !
This mentality is common under labor and management
-Huge lack of investing in modern techniques and tooling (why?, we are Brtitish!)
-Week governments unable to make plans for the coming decades, only interested in short term successes

Government intervention + unions = British crapcans. and the aviation industry is on line two

Is it me or does Michael Edwardes look like a little jumped up twat who doesn't give a rats arse for the working stiff..?

I had many breakdowns on a rover in the 1970's Swore I would never buy another British car. I haven't and I have been happy ever since that decision!!!!

I served an apprenticeship and worked at AEC (ASSOCIATED EQUIPMENT COMPANY) of Southall Middlesex between 1969 and 1976. Another one of the problems with BL was that they should have had the cars and commercial vehicles as two separate entities. AEC’s order books were full and they had a loyal customer base, yet “stokes” closed down a highly respected and viable custom manufacturer of Lorries and Buses. Yet it seems to be the same throughout British industry to take over the opposition and then close them down. Better to remain a family business free of the stock exchange😇

Shocking stuff!! I served my time as a mechsnic , not just a 'fitter' in a Triumph/Rover/Jaguar franchise , had lot of pride in the trade .

It's often said the BMW taught austin/rover how to make a car. It was infact honda, primarily with the acclaim. In the earlier 80's Leyland service departments were shocked by the reduction in warranty claims for the acclaim. Not to mention not seeing the vehicle from one year to the next for annual servicing.

Austin Rover ditched the Triumph Acclaim after 3 years , It was only a stop gap car to replace the Allegro . The Acclaim was a wonderful car , only to be replaced by the Maestro and Montego. Both horrible rot boxes .

The Rover216 was a good little car.

Ironic that Halewood is one of Fords last factories left in the UK, opposite of the predictions in the 1980s

Having worked in automotive for 46 years as a supplier and just retired, I'll go with my old friend and manager - There is no common sense in the automotive industry.

No money for proper investment in fresh technologies and designs because they were constantly on strike and building pure shite compared to the competition, whose offerings they must have been totally ignorant of!

Typical British disaster zone!

British cars 🚗 had terrible quality problems, that is why people stopped buying them😊

I worked for British Leyland from 1966 until the 80s. What a chaotic affair. The engines were ancient, the body designs were cobbled together using existing panels they though would fit to save money. We had almost monthly management changes. The machinery where I worked had war department on them and most were worn out from the war years. The workforce were largely disaffected and most of us knew we were on a sinking ship. Ghastly time.

Cavalier was called the rep mobile

Crap cars embarrassing

Britain did not succeed like Germany, Japan ,France ,Italy, USA and even Swidon to manufacture a car for growing Middle class in 60 s what to be a reliable and quality machine. Even the Mini was rubbish. They can produce super luxury expensive vehicles like Rollse, Bentley, Jaguar and Aston, but that was cars only for top 2 percent of the population. All other cars what they produce was a bit better than Soviet cars and in many cases even worst .Usa lost the battle against the Japanese and The Germans only because of stupid green regulations. England lost because their cars was the worst quality ever .They still will keep some of the companies if it was only the old traditional industrial powers on the scene like Germany, France ,Italy and USA. But the immense and unbelievable rise of Japanese car industry with their brilliant engineering, quality control killed British motor industry, at least without full foreign takeover. Japanese take something like 30 percent of all automotive market in the world. AND THEY HAVE DONE THAT FAIR AND SQUARE. THEY ARE SIMPLY MUCH BETTER IN CAR ENGINEERING THAN US .

The British Communists like Tony Benn and Derek Robinson were the worst offenders in ruining the car industry. Benn with his bigger is better and encouraging BMC to buy Pressed Steel thus ruining all those other companies which relied on Pressed Steel for their bodies thus precipitating the unworkable British Leyland . Along with the other heroes of the Soviet Union and poor direction and management at the top of BL I'm surprised Rover lasted as long as it did especially as thieves stole large sums of money.

These media types always know everything and how to fix everything - bet most have never done a proper days work. Never supporting British industry = pay day 😵🤪😵‍💫

My brilliant hindsight solution for BMC:
a) Slash the number of marques to a minimum in 1952. Cut upper management to the bone and foster a merit based hierarchy rather than an upstairs/downstairs split.
b) Focus on the MORRIS MINOR - give it a B-Series, put big brakes on and build them exactly like VW - laser focus, beautiful quality and yearly updates. Market aggressively in the USA via Canada.
c) Learn from Japan: make oiltight engines, unbreakable electrics and rock hard running gear, be NEAT, incorporate the Unions into the Corporation.
d) Listen to BMC Australia - they knew what they were talking about.

Shocking decline from pretty much the biggest market share in the car industry, to virtually 0 within a few decades. That's what happens if you don't properly support the industry properly

wow the robots are way ahead of the cars they are making

Austin Rover, British Leyland, whatever name you want to use, their cars were complete dogshit, combined with woeful productivity due to outdated processes and the unions, is it any wonder they collapsed.

It is sad to watch videos of the self destruction of Britain as a nation by the Communist Union movement , what the Germans could not succeed in doing the Unions gutted Britain from within .

lol, German made bots...
in the same time,German car factories been filled to the rim with bots, in the 1970s..

Extra £40 for a German model Sierra!

Soooo... Was the Montego enough to save Leyland???

😁😁😁

I am an ex Morris Cowley employee, of 25 years and believe the demise of the British car industry is to be laid of the door, such men and money makers, as Edwards and his crew. and he had the gall to lay, the blame upon the work force. I am proud that my work skills were used from 1957 for 25 years at Morris Motors, Cowley.

It used to be said that the VW Beetle is the first car in the UK that could be driven all the way from London to Edinburgh without breaking down.

"The further south you go in Europe the poorer the people get". I'm sorry, you are such a piece of feces. You overbearing, stuck up, arrogant British suit wearer. 2021, Britain is now about the poorest country in the first world. 98% civil servants, no jobs, no industry, no empire. Hate.

Good, they have advanced robots. But they build ugly, silly rock-boxes.

Why do they always proudly emphasize that half of the market is theirs. Half is never enough. I don't want half a glass of wine.

Poor Britain. Won the war and lost the peace. While Germany and Japan rebuilt their industrial infrastructure, US and Britain pumped out cars. By the 1960s, first the Germans, then the Japanese started producing cars from modern factories with modern workforce rules producing modern cars. They also were more profitable.

Oddly enough, they never officially offered the British Leyland (or, for that matter, BMC) line to Germany. Of course, a true Brit hates the hun, but Germany was one of the biggest economies in Europe and, in fact, the world. Leaving the import of these brands to small independents… oh well, these pos probably never would have had a chance in Germany anyway. Outdated, unreliable, shoddy British Elend.

Alternative names for "British Car Industry" - "San Marino Football Team", "Saddam Hussein Hiding Techniques", "Tasty Low Fat Food", "Ben Affleck in Pearl Harbour"

Wilmot Breeden Ltd in Fordhouse Lane,also made the bumpers for the Austin Taxi FX4 london black cab...

All those trouble spots, car makers, shipping railways miners dockers postal power workers are but a shadow of their former self they no longer have the power to bring the country to a halt, I have been in a union now for some 53 years and upon reflection our unions were their own worse enemy. But on the other side of the fence the management what fools they were straight out of uni and clueless to the real world, you cant learn about that from reading a frigging book. There was a midway point where the two should have come together to face the common enemy of mass unemployment , but thats long past now. Today we wonder how china is so strong, its the west shipping out its industries and sacrificing its own workforce on the alter of PROFIT for their shareholders and a global aspiration , they will rule the day sometime in the future.The only way they can sell more is to bring in more people to a country it matters not one jot if they receive Gov money or earn it, they want it . we live in a crazy world now.

Nissan Washington was set up on the express proviso that there would be only one union representing all the workers. As a result there wasn't one strike between 1985 and 2015. Abingdon, Luton, Dagenham etc all had many different unions. From this, we can see that it is unions that stifle factories and create unemployment.
Unions, ironically, are the worst enemy a worker can have. However, if the worker is lazy, frequently absent, incompetent or dishonest, unions are wonderful for this kind of parasite.
When Ford started production, they had no unions and paid workers TWICE the normal rate. Eventually the factory became unionised, then the wages progressively dropped until they were about the same as Chrysler or General Motors.

A lack of investment in R&D and technology killed British car industry, Labour should have insisted on cuts to jobs and invested more in higher paid technical jobs.

At 5m30s I'm sure that's the theme from Carry On Camping!