The event that signalled the end to that period – which began in the '70s and saw the UK's machine tool firms 'saved' by being absorbed into larger companies – was the management buyout of Matrix Churchill from TI Group. This MBO marked the end of a "long and particularly unfruitful period", we wrote.
The 'saviours' of the machine tool industry did not understand and mostly had no experience of machine tool building and sales. "With monotonous regularity, the big new owners went about dispensing with internationally-known machine tool names, re-launching them under meaningless group names, and foisting company logos and group liveries on them. Having done which, they then loaded them with the scale of overheads needed to keep the central headquarters staff in the style to which they were accustomed", Machinery hammered home.
It would not be easy for these newly free companies, we highlighted, but stated that "it behoves every machine tool user in Britain, at least, to give them maximum support".
British industrial performance
The opening page of the news section had a nearly one-page article based on a National Economic Development Council report – British industrial performance and international competitiveness. In its analysis, based on 1985 figures, manufacturing contributed 25% of GDP (it is around 11% of gross value added today – GVA is synonymous with GDP), lower than West Germany (yes, there was an East Germany then), Italy and France. For banking, finance and insurance, the UK was well ahead even then, with more than an 18% share of the economy (9.4% GVA in 2011), three times the share of the nearest country, Italy. However, if all services, plus distribution, hotels and catering are taken into account, we noted that the economies of the UK, West Germany, France and Italy looked pretty similar (49 to 54% of the economy).
Drawing on another source – De-industrialisation and foreign trade, by Re Rowthorn and JR Wells – in the same article we noted that this said manufacturing is the main source of productivity growth and that improved living standards will largely depend on its success.
Investment and productivity need to be boosted, then, we said, offering that banking finance and insurance had already grown phenomenally on the back of huge investment and asked how much more could it give. Oil revenues would decline and non-manufactures, food and raw materials would similarly would not grow. This all pointed to the importance of manufacturing in driving growth, we said. Such will be a recurring theme as we travel across the years.
Quality coverage
Our lead feature in the first issue of 1988 was on BS5750 – the forerunner to today's ISO 9001 quality management standard. The government's national quality campaign, kicked off in 1983, had highlighted this standard's importance in underpinning better quality – BS 5750's vintage is 1979, in fact, with this also drawing on previous standards. We took readers through the steps required to obtain the BS5750 mark of quality by exampling one company that had done so – London-based High Speed Productions. A sheet metalworking company that supplied to the business machine industry, the company's managing director was clear that, while it had been a major undertaking requiring major commitment, he thought that the company wouldn't have been in business, if it didn't have BS5750.
HSP had secured more business and its customer base was also "a better type of customer", while the company was "working more efficiently and productively".
Events this month:
[] Margaret Thatcher becomes longest-serving British PM of 20th century
[] First-class cricket debut of Brian Lara, Trinidad & Tobago v Leeward Islands
[] Beatle George Harrison releases 'When We Was Fab'
[] Australia's 200th anniversary
First published, Machinery, January, 2013
