What's Good For Ford Is Good For The UK

Remember that old saying, “What’s good for GM is good for America”? Well it seems that the UK is developing a similar ethos. “What’s good for Ford is good for the UK”. Now, this isn’t some arrogant Ford executive trying to brainwash the UK public that buying their cars is their public duty. There really is a good reason behind this. Honestly.

Easier.com reports that a Ford Fiesta is embarking on a 15,000 mile trip across 21 countries (a corporate sponsored Ford Fiesta, not just some random nutter with a lot of time on his hands). The point of the exercise is to metaphorically demonstrate the “One Ford” mantra. You know, “a global car going on a round the world trip”. But what has this exercise got to do with the UK economy?

Well, the Fiesta’s 1.6 liter petrol engine is built in Bridgend, Wales, UK. And since the Fiesta (and many other Fords) is going to be global, rather than regional, this puts more emphasis on the engine manufacturing plants in the UK as they’ll have to export more around the world while designs become more uniform.

Naturally, there was a politician to crow about this and his name was Mark Prisk, the Business Minister for the UK, “It is a great achievement for the UK that nearly a third of all cars built by Ford globally will have an engine that’s been designed and built by Ford in the UK. It’s a good example of the UK as a world class manufacturing base that can successfully export over the world.”

Ford didn’t shy away from the PR circus. “Ford’s UK operations are vital to our global strategy and they draw on an engineering resource that has tremendous potential to expand.” said Jon Greenwell, Chairman of Ford UK. Now don’t get me wrong, this is good news for the UK economy. We need to bring back manufacturing after the disastrous attempt to be “financial engineers.” But the cynical side of me thinks this is all filler. After all, if Ford can contemplate building cars in China and exporting them, then I’m pretty sure they’ll pack up the engine hub in the UK and ship it to a lower cost country the moment their exchange rate becomes more favorable. But no worries there. The US dollar still buys a lot of pounds. And engines.