Elon Musk turned up at GigaFactory Berlin - which will start producing Teslas by year end… his plane stopped off in UK over the weekend… as it did last June… meeting anyone interesting @elonmusk ?

Industry insiders report considerable Govt effort going into wooing him to UK…
The question would be how to persuade him that he can’t just freely serve UK market tariff free from Berlin factory… get into quite complex rules of origin calculations on electric cars, which were the subject of very last minute phase in negotiations between PM and VDL.
many years ago U.K. certainly an option,
when he announced Berlin in 2019 he was asked by a British journalist why not UK… he referenced Brexit - though that was while immediate tariffs/ no deal were still a possibility - does the deal remove the risk he identified then?
What we do know is that in 2019 Government showed his team site near Manchester… and that last June it was reported that a site in the south west near Bristol was also being pushed, and indeed visited…

then all gets v interesting re potential post Brexit industrial incentives
Industry wisdom has been that UK market alone not big enough to sustain a separate car factory (in addition to Berlin) - but perhaps the ban on combustion engines might just change that maths… as pointed out below, there may be other options…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Faisal Islam

Faisal Islam Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @faisalislam

12 May
UK GDP in Q1 fell 1.5%, after the second lockdown... driven by hits to household consumption and investment, but rebound had already begun by end of that quarter in March as restrictions lifted - growth of 2.1%.
Trade figures out this morning give a full quarters post Brexit transition picture...

UK exports to the EU down 18.1%
Imports from EU down 21.7% versus Q4 2020

Non EU exports up 0.4%, imports down 0.9% in same time period ...
Various ways to compare trade figures - basic point - full quarter gives fuller picture than monthly figures...using 2019 as more normal figure than 2020

Eg. Q1 2021 goods exports to EU £32bn down 29% from £45bn in Q1 2019.

Same quarter non EU £41bn, down 7% from £44.5bn in 19
Read 6 tweets
11 May
“My Government will ensure that public finances will return to a sustainable path once recovery secured…” Queens speech…
Government will “modernise the planning system so that more homes can be built"
“my ministers will deepen trade ties in the Gulf, Africa and the Indo-Pacific”….

And what about the US trade deal?
#QueensSpeech
Read 4 tweets
7 May
One pattern to look for over weekend is impact of massive economic state interventions (in emergency)on politics.

No bigger policy impact than interventions that keep you paid & in a job, & then jabbed & able to regain freedom.

In theory would boost all incumbent Governments
…call is looking good as we stand - incumbents across Britain benefit from intervening to affect people’s lives during this crisis, like never before.

truly staggering to really consider how many Britons have been directly impacted by actions of Governments over past 12 months
incumbent party in England wins councils/councillors, 11 years into Westmin Govt

incumbent party in Scotland gains constituencies, 10 years into Holyrood Govt

incumbent party in Wales gets working majority matching best result, after 22 years in charge in Cardiff

Vaccine Vote.
Read 7 tweets
6 May
As we await the Bank of England’s new forecast and policy decisions - furlough statistics released this morning show use of the job retention scheme still high, but down just ahead of lifting of lockdown at end March - 4.2 million. Cumulative £61.3bn spent supporting wages. Image
Bank of England: “GDP is expected to rise sharply in 2021 Q2” and recover to pre Covid levels over the remainder of this year “absent restrictions”...
Outlook remains uncertain.
Policy unchanged
Lost pandemic output now forecast to be made up within 2021, says Bank of england: Image
Read 8 tweets
5 May
Extraordinary development that the US is now backing a pandemic waiver on vaccine patents - the WTO boss warned in an interview with me of “unacceptable iniquities” in spread of vaccines...
Biden’s trade Rep Tai has been seeing vacc makers - presumption was that the threat of a patent waiver was mainly a form of leverage... Tai raised issue in a bilateral with UK Trade Sec Truss last month highlighting “need to support production equitable distribution of vaccines”
In March my colleague @deb_cohen obtained the draft of discussions at WTO showing US, UK and Swiss pushing back against the efforts of India and South Africa - we discussed extensively on Newsnight - see this thread:
Read 4 tweets
29 Apr
NEW: Fishing groups decry failure to strike 2021 deal with Norway as a “disgrace” & “disaster”. UK Fisheries group say Government was “unable even to maintain the rights we have had to fish in Norwegian waters for decades”.

Say Norway will continue to export cod here tariff free
Defra confirms:

“We put forward a fair offer on access to UK waters and the exchange of fishing quotas, but we have concluded that our positions remain too far apart to reach an agreement this year.”
Operator of the UK’s biggest fishing vessel, currently in dock in Hull, suggests it may have done its last catch, and that all cod will have to be imported now, after failure to secure deals (apart from Svalbard) in waters fished routinely last year

Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

:(