De-industrialising Britain, Part 2
The Financial Times today publishes a fascinating analysis by Chris Giles of the decline of manufacturing in the UK since Labour came to power.
It shows, from public statistics, that the manufacturing sector, which accounted for 20 per cent of the economy in 1997, by 2007 represented just 12.4 per cent. Now, thanks to the recession, it’s just over 11 per cent. The decline during the past 12 years has been three times as fast as under Mrs Thatcher, invariably blamed by Labour for Britain’s industrial decline.
Under her governments, manufacturing declined from 25.8 per cent of output to 22.5 per cent. Last week, Lord Mandelson told the FT: “In the 1980s and 1990s we as a country did not do enough to encourage manufacturing and this approach led to colossal economic damage.” Maybe so, but how in that case would he characterise the damage done under Labour? What’s three times greater than colossal?
Who have been the actual gainers under Labour? Real estate and banks. Plus the public sector, of course.
Anonymous (not verified) wrote,
Wed, 16/12/2009 - 13:48
Does looking at the decline in the proportion of the economy that manufacturing represents give a true reflection of the decline of that sector? What proportion of the decline is due to growth in the other sectors and so what was the real decline of manufacturing output?
I'm asking this as someone who doesn't have a great deal of knowledge about the sectoral breakdown of the economy so apologies if it's an obvious question.
Post new comment