Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

BROWSE MY BOOKS WITH THESE LINKS 

    Malcolm Blair-Robinson U.S        

    Malcolm Blair-Robinson U.K.

This Blog, as regular readers know, constantly laments the chronic imbalances in the UK economy. Now the Chief Economist at the BoE has drawn attention to the lack of adequate investment by corporates, who are giving shareholders first pull at the cash generated by profits. Apparently in 1970 £10 in every £100 of profit was paid out in dividends; now the payout figure is £60. The result is chronic underinvestment which is inhibiting growth. It also inflates assets above their worth and could be described as one of several root causes of the dysfunction growing in the way the UK economy works.

In the strategic sense it is one of the most important pieces of news to appear today. It is a shame that few will heed it.

Things are now getting out of control as a consequence of the knock on effects of the migrant crisis in Calais and an industrial dispute by French ferry workers. Both the French and the British authorities blame each other. Both are at fault. French police are slapdash about enforcing law and order in the vicinity of the Tunnel entrance outside Calais and the British have made no attempt to find a solution to the issue of a diaspora of thousands trying to get into the UK. An extreme solution would be to build a large camp near Dover on land owned by the MOD, allow all the migrants in, detain them in the camp, then repatriate them all to their country of origin, regardless of the conditions there. Such a heartless policy would cause an outcry and rightly so. But somewhere between it and the mess at the moment lies a manageable path which combines compassion and level headedness into a plan to gain control.

So far there is failure at every level in the EU over this diaspora. There is no concerted effort to hunt down the traffickers, there is no EU wide plan to relocate the migrants and there is no forceful effort to prevent the boats setting sail from the North African coast. There are fragmented efforts in all these areas which are not effective. Britain has been a leading exponent of all the failed interventions which have contributed to the conditions which are allowing this terrible industry of human despair to prosper and therefore it behoves the United Kingdom, so often puffed up about its place of influence in the world, not to turn its back but to get stuck in.