Ford of Britain chairman Roger Putnam has ruled out a return to building Ford-badged cars in the UK three years after the company ended Fiesta production at Dagenham, east of London.
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He said it was impossible to compete with low-cost production areas when producing high-volume products and Ford would concentrate on producing Premier Automotive Group cars (Jaguar, Land Rover, Aston Martin) and building engines.
Ford makes diesel engines at Dagenham and assembles some Ford-badged Transit vans in Southampton but its blue oval-badged cars come from Germany and Spain while the new Tourneo light van is imported from Turkey.
Putnam said: “Unless you are a Japanese sub assembler you cannot get the critical mass or cost benefits or compete with markets which are moving ever eastwards, including eastern Europe.
“To try and compete with the low-cost territories by starting again in the UK would be impossible. I think it is a fact of life that has been coming for a while. It does not help to have an endlessly volatile exchange rate which makes the business on a global basis so unpredictable.”
He also cited problems training and attracting skilled people into the manufacturing sector. Putnam added: “We have never been on the cutting edge of efficiency and flexibility although our Jaguar Halewood and Transit Southampton plants show what can be achieved.”
Putnam questioned if forecast record sales for this year will materialise, citing Ford’s forecast of “being just shy of last year” although he admitted the company had increased orders recently.
Putnam added: “There are three things lurking in the background, oil and steel prices plus interest rates, things which keep you awake at night.”
But he doubted if interest rates would rise sufficiently to create a “market wobble” because of the detrimental impact on the pound’s value.
