Bill Gleeson: Great news from Ford – but why now?

Dec 19 2007 by Bill Gleeson, Liverpool Daily Post

IT’S great news that Ford plans to produce a second Land Rover model at Halewood.

The decision to build the LRX model at the factory appears to be another example of how the Merseyside car industry has remained resilient at a time when the rest of the automotive sector has struggled.

Halewood, long dubbed the best in the Ford group, will from 2009 be home to three models, the Jaguar X-type, the Land Rover Freelander 2 and the LRX.

But there is one suspicious element about this news – its timing. Ford will shortly dispose of its Jaguar and Land Rover models. Isn’t it odd, then, that Detroit is busying itself with decisions that will become somebody else’s responsibility quite possibly as early as this week.

Perhaps they are trying to mollify the workforce. So I wouldn’t get too carried away about this announcement just yet; not until the new owner makes its support for the new project known.

MORECAMBE and Wise had a sketch where Eric would answer the phone and say “Oh, you don’t say,” several times before replacing the receiver. Ernie would then ask: “Who was that?” only for Eric to reply: “He wouldn’t say.”

It can be a bit like that with Liverpool Football Club at the moment. The club has been humming and hawing about its new stadium for many months, but generally it hasn’t been very good at telling anybody the reasons for the delay.

Whenever a reporter from this or any other newspaper makes an enquiry about developments, they are told: “We’re not saying.”

The lack of communication has caused considerable concern among supporters and raised doubts about the whole stadium project.

Football fans are increasingly financially literate and ask whether the delays are down to muddle and confusion at the club about design or whether Liverpool can no longer afford the rising costs? Or are the club’s American owners losing interest in the plan? Has the weak dollar undermined their ability to borrow sufficient sterling from UK banks? Could the club’s need to conserve resources for the stadium lie behind the manager’s recent outburst about a lack of funds for the January transfer window?

Instead of hiding behind the bland “No comment”, Liverpool could easily tackle the doubts by telling the truth a bit more promptly than has been the case. Such a policy wouldn’t hurt and would quash the darker fears of some of the club’s fans before they take hold.

THE big message that comes out of the latest official output figures for the Merseyside sub-region, a subject tackled in depth on this page, is what a long haul it is to change economic performance.

Despite billions of pounds of Objective 1 cash from Brussels during the past 13 years, the area’s relative economic performance has hardly changed when compared to the rest of the UK.

That is in part caused by the fact that the rest of the UK has been doing so well for so long. It’s hard to catch up when everybody else is sprinting away at full speed.

It’s a pity that such comparisons remain the benchmark for success or failure. Maybe it’s time to find some more achievable and relevant measures for assessing the region’s progress.

On a brighter note, the sub-region’s performance should improve when 2008’s figures are published. The 200 new shops at Liverpool One, the extra British and European tourists visiting Merseyside for Capital of Culture year, and a £50m contribution from the new arena and convention centre will all help boost local output figures.