West Country Cash

Straight talking from the top, at MoD Abbey Wood.

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Thu, 12 May 2011 10:03:24 +0000

Why do military jets cost billions more than planned? Well, "it's a bit like buying a conservatory."

How many jobs are at risk at the MoD's centre at Abbey Wood, near Bristol?
"It could be as many as 2,000 jobs, yes. That is entirely within the realms of possibility."

Civil servants are normally cautious, tight-lipped people. Engineers, in my experience, rarely like sweeping statements. And military people are almost congenitally discreet.

So when I arrived to interview Britain's senior military engineering civil servant, I didn't expect much.

But Dr Andrew Tyler is renowned for his plain speaking approach. The man who leads 21,000 people who buy all the kit for the armed forces had clearly had enough of softly softly. He was fed up of reading stories about dodgy radios and unprotected land rovers; 'our brave soldiers let down by the pen-pushers', as the papers put it.

"It is one of my biggest frustrations that we are a bunch of bureaucratic pen-pushers," he told me. "Nothing could be further from the truth."

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We walked around the calm landscaped grounds of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) headquarters near Bristol, and he pointed to an office block. "Every office here is in constant contact with the front line," he insisted. "The teams are just a phone call away from Libya, an email from Afghanistan."

Inside Abbey Wood with the boss

Buying hi-tech equipment for the armed forces is not easy. Dr Tyler wants us all to understand how enormously complex it is. Having spent a day inside the nuclear submarine factory his team run, I can well believe it.

But does that excuse multi-billion pound cost over-runs?

The RAF's new fast jet, the Typhoon, is £3.5 bn over budget. It's worth spelling that out: £3,500,000,000 more than was originally estimated. How does that happen?

The standard tactic for disarming this dangerous question is to bore you to death. Defence officials bombard you with details of multiple tenders, of specification shifts, of sophisticated technology prototypes.

Andrew Tyler talks about conservatories. "You sit down with your wife," he tells me, as if we were leaning on the bar, "You budget for eight or nine thousand pounds, and as sure as eggs is eggs, when the builder leaves the premises you've got a bill for fifteen."

It's refreshing. The problem is in the initial estimates, he explains. 'Natural human optimism' produces low figures when the aircraft carrier or submarine is being planned. And then, just like the builder in your back garden, everything goes up.

8,000 people work at MoD Abbey Wood

He was just as frank on jobs. When the defence secretary announced, back in October, that a quarter of all MoD jobs would go by 2015, we all did the maths. 8,000 people work at Abbey Wood, so that sounded like 2,000 job losses. But for months, the MoD has been silent on the detail.

Not Dr Tyler. 2,000 job losses is "entirely within the realms of possibility". Abbey Wood is on a quest for even greater efficiency, he explains, and "that is definitely going to require doing the same thing with less people. It could be as many as 2,000 people, yes."

Now this isn't a bolt from the blue. He is essentially confirming what we already knew. People won't be leaving overnight, the process will take three years. A voluntary redundancy scheme is already proving popular.

But what is really remarkable here is the candour. We have grown used to Whitehall code, where everything is carefully couched and you have to read between the lines. Andrew Tyler clearly thinks that culture has brought us billion pound overspends and nervous staff. It is now time, he is saying, to be honest about what submarines and fast jets will actually cost, and tell staff how many jobs will actually go.

There is a footnote to this story. One of those jobs that will go is the Chief Operating Officer. Yes, Dr Tyler himself has been restructured out of the MoD. By the end of the year, his post will be no more, and he will be back in the private commercial world. Inside the world of defence contracting, people will remember him for lots of technical and substantial changes.

Outside, we will remember a military engineer who decided it was time to rename 'personal operational excavation devices', and call a spade a spade.

Inside the Royal Navy's secret submarine factory

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Mon, 09 May 2011 17:56:40 +0000

"I always say that any day when you don't see a submarine is a day wasted."

Jon Swift loves his subs, that much is clear. For an engineer, they are the ultimate challenge.

"We take a metal tube, put a nuclear reactor in it and a hundred sailors. Then we cram every available space with weapons and hi-tech equipment. Finally, we send it deep into the ocean. Everything has to be safe - and seen to be safe."

Mr Swift is also passionate about his job. Which is at once easy and impossible to describe. Simply put, he is in charge of making seven new nuclear submarines for the Royal Navy.

The actual metal-banging is done by BAE Systems (as well as a vast amount of computer-aided design and hi-tech system installation). 5,000 people work at the company's submarine yard in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria.

Royal Navy Engineers work alongside the civilians, ensuring everything is as they want it.

Jon Swift leads a team of 100 who do that very 21st century job: Project Management.

He is based at MoD Abbey Wood, a vast complex of offices perched on the ring road round Bristol's northern fringe. 8,000 people work here, civilians and uniformed people, finding, buying and maintaining every piece of kit used by the armed forces.

Abbey Wood takes a pounding in the media. When soldiers don't get the right kit in the desert, it's the 'pen-pushers of Abbey Wood' who are blamed.

Now Abbey Wood's top brass want to tell their side of the story. Two of us were invited in, to see the projects they are most proud of. First up, submarines.

In some ways it's a surprising story to pick, from an MoD point of view. HMS Astute, the first of the new breed, already has its own archive of news stories. First, there was the unfortunate episode off Skye, when she ran aground in sea trials. Then there was the tragedy in Southampton Docks, when a crewman turned a weapon on an officer.

But Jon Swift is on the front foot. He shows me round the enormous Barrow yard like an enthusiastic small boy with the world's best train set. Above us, the huge boats loom. It is an extraordinary place.

"Abbey Wood is the office," he smiles, "but here's where I come for a dose of engineering. Being part of the submarine programme gives you great pride: the power, the stealth, the sheer complexity."

I have never been in a factory like this.
And with good reason. There is no other factory like this.
No-one else makes nuclear submarines. And that can be a problem.

If Jon Swift and his team don't like what BAE Systems are doing, they can't go anywhere else for their subs. BAE Systems have a monopoly. Of course, he points out, this is also a "monopsony" (now there's a word for scrabble lovers). Jon, and the Royal Navy, is the only customer. Who else buys nuclear submarines?

"It's like a marriage," he explains, "but not one that's going to end in divorce. We work very closely together. I have a team of 30 people here on site, it's all very hands on, eyes on." Unlike a normal business relationship, both sides see each other's numbers. Both sides need this programme to work. And yes, there are low points as well as high points.

Probably the lowest was the day the National Audit Office published the increase in costs. The MoD's original estimate for the first three boats was £2.58bn, but they have come in at £3.8bn, a cool £1,200,000,000 over budget. And that is definitely one of Jon Swift's jobs.

"It's absolutely important that we deliver on time and to cost, but the difficulty with these complex major projects is getting those original estimates right."

It is true that few experts question the final bill. Around a billion pounds for a nuclear sub is "the going rate", one told me. The problem is those early estimates, when ministers want to hear good news, and everyone involved guesses low. Then things get complicated. Jon Swift's team check every increase, but gradually the bill heads north until we have a billion pound overspend.

We stand high in the dockyard now, on a gantry above both submarines. John Swift looks down on them, with affection as well as pride. It is his job to defend the public finances of this project, but also, I realise, to appreciate the engineering.

"The astute class submarine," he smiles, "she's big she's black and she's awesome, and like any primadonna, she's worth waiting for."

Labour of Hercules? What next for RAF Lyneham

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:37:18 +0000

In July 2011 the last Hercules will leave the RAF's base at Lyneham, in North Wiltshire, for ever. The base has been home to the cargo fleet for decades, but the MoD only wants one long haul airbase, and that is to be Brize Norton, just up the road in Oxfordshire.

The burning question, then, is what happens to the Lyneham site. It is vast, 1,300 acres. It brings in £90m to the pubs, taxis and traders of North Wiltshire. Close on 3,000 jobs depend on the base indirectly, according to the local chamber of commerce.

Eddy Shah has a plan. It's ambitious, in fact it's pretty spectacular. It features a snowdome; a Wiltshire Theme Park, complete with replica Stonehenge; an education centre and a thousand eco-homes.

"Heston Blumenthal is signed up to the catering plan," explains Eddy, as he likes to be known. "We've got over 1,000 acres here, we've got a bit of everything, I think this is a new kind of industrial revolution."

If you want to see the plans for yourself, have a look here.
LynehamPropoalsEddyShah.pdf

Now Eddy Shah is a strong salesman, and he makes his case spectacularly. He takes me to an abandoned naval training station near Corsham. HMS Arthur once trained a young Prince Philip, but twenty years ago it was closed, and nothing was done with the site. The place is now crawling with brambles, and covered in graffiti.

"My fear is that this is what will happen to Lyneham," he tells me. "If the MoD don't get a move on and make a decision, it will just go to wrack and ruin."

It's a strong campaigning tactic, for sure. But is it a little, well, hasty?

There is evidence the MoD is looking hard at a military future for the base. 20,000 soldiers and airforce personnel are on their way back from Germany, now the Cold War is well and truly over. Homes and training bases must be found.

"The Army want to come to Lyneham," the local MP tells me. James Gray has been lobbying hard, and is on good terms with both Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, and David Cameron. "They've both told me Lyneham has a very good case," he insists.

In fact, just last week I happened to hear Liam Fox at a Chamber of Commerce dinner in Bristol. He was making a speech, he could pick his subjects. And he chose Lyneham, interestingly. Taxpayers, he told us, are paying £250m a year to keep troops in Germany - and that is just on allowances.

"I would much rather spend that money in the British economy," he said, to much applause. My ears pricked up, because Liam Fox could have kept quiet. He was in Bristol, after all, and talking to a business audience. Why mention Lyneham, unless you are minded to send some work its way?

I put it to Eddy Shah that perhaps he was telling people the MoD would abandon Lyneham simply to bolster support for his own, commercial, plan. He laughed that one off. "I'm 67, the last thing I want is another big project! No, the message is clear - MoD: make your mind up. Otherwise, this community will die."

The Ministry remains tight-lipped. A decision will be taken before the Parliamentary break in the summer, I'm told. Well, if they decide to close Lyneham for good, Wiltshire may soon have a new theme park for skiing druids.

A Racing Certainty: Cheltenham Festival brings in the cash

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 15:30:31 +0000

"The best way to make a small fortune here is to arrive with a large one!"

The eyes are twinkling, the voice is Irish: it must be Cheltenham Race Week.

But Frank is not drinking Guinness. He's on white wine, in a thoroughly chic bar at a newly revamped hotel overlooking the racecourse. Rooms here go from £250 a night to £1000 for "expansive" suites, which come - I kid you not - with a private dining room attached.

I thought Ireland was bankrupt. The news desk had asked me to see how Cheltenham would cope without its annual injection of blarney and cash. Well, Frank and his friends have no intention of cutting back.

"It's the top sporting event of the year in Europe - in the world," they insist. "This is their golden week, they're entitled to charge for it -" He breaks off suddenly, looking at the race on the TV behind him, "How is that horse doing now then?!"

More laughter.

The manager estimates the cost of refurbishing Ellenborough Park at "around £15 million". It looks like money well spent. Graham Vass admits that filling his 62 rooms during race week "is pretty simple", but also claims to be full for several weeks to come. The world might be reeling from economic and natural disasters, but there are still enough super-rich to keep 120 cooks, chambermaids, valets and spa staff in work here.

There is another end of the market in Cheltenham, where a night's accommodation will cost you the price of a bottle of wine at Ellenborough Park.

This is the nerve centre of an extraordinary operation that finds rooms for a thousand punters in race week, at £50 a night.

Twelve years ago Liz Coe moved out of her own bedroom, sent her husband to a friend for the week and took in some racegoers. The idea caught on, and now she has five rooms booked all week in her modest family home. Hundreds of others are doing the same, earning valuable cash.

But the business has now gone mental. I spent two hours with Liz, on the night before the races, and her two phones literally never stopped.

Dermot was trying to find the house he was booked into. Jill had an extra room free if there were new clients. Random racegoers were calling, prompted by her website, desperate to find a room.

"Every year I try and get people to book early, book before Christmas, but they're like little boys," she smiles, "it's always the same. I call Ireland 'Last Minute dot com'!"

They say you can make money at the top of the market, and the at the bottom. Raceweek in Cheltenham is bearing that old rule out well. B&Bs are reporting a lot of people cutting their week to two nights. Restaurants have ordered less champagne.

But one way or another, there's still plenty of money coming racing this week.

"Training Pipeline is blocked" says Pump Supremo

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 13:16:07 +0000

Terry Newby knows his pumps.

They are very big. Very strong. When an oil rig catches fire, it's one of his that puts it out.

Terry is Operations Director at SPP Pumps, one of those hidden gems of British manufacturing. Tucked away in a quiet yard in the Forest of Dean, it is home to highly skilled engineers who make some of the most respected pumps in the business.

They've carved out a niche, like so many great west country firms, by going bespoke. "We don't sell pumps," Terry smiles, "we sell solutions. We make custom-engineered pumps for our customers to fit their precise needs. If you could buy our pumps in a box, we'd be dead in the water."

Terry shows me shelves of raw material, iron and steel by the bar. Material doesn't come any more raw than this. When they leave, every pipe, every dial, every rivet has been welded and lathed and machined here by hand. 170 engineers work here, in what is a pretty jovial atmosphere.

The firm has grown over the last ten years, building to a turnover of some £50m from about half that in 2002. As oil prices rise, their orders are growing too. When oil is high, drilling firms decide to upgrade their fire protection.

So far, it could be the setting for a ministerial visit. Vince Cable would extol the virtues of British engineering expertise, the strengths of an export economy, the need to "rebalance", with more of this, and less reliance on shopping.

But if politicians came here, they would get more than they bargained for. In a corner of the factory, I met up with a number of Gloucestershire manufacturers, and all had sharp words for politicians - of all colours.

First, the old story of Whitehall's left and right hands. SPP Pumps usually takes on new apprentices every year. But in 2011, they won't be hiring. Why not? Because the government is planning to raise retirement ages. And you don't have to be a pumping expert to know that if fewer people are coming out of the top of the pipe, you can't let as many in at the bottom.

Second, I hear about red tape. Rosemary Robinson runs a firm near Stroud, called Arc Energy. She needed a welder. "The only qualified welding engineer I could find was from outside the EU, and he couldn't be bothered with the immigration paperwork."

So why are there no home grown welders? Colin Hygate, whose firm Green Fuels have designed and made the world's first DIY biodiesel, is with us too. He lists the skills that are going.
"Millers, turners, welders, machinists - it's the technician level we're lacking. And there's no sign of more people coming through the system."

Colin and Rosemary think schools could do more. Manufacturing, they complain, is far cooler, far more interesting than careers advisors realise.

But what, I ask them, of the government's much trumpetted push for more apprentices?

"Do they mean retailing and hairdressing, or actual manufacturing?" Don Burgess speaks for the Federation of Small Businesses in Gloucestershire, and he's sceptical. He points out that Tesco and MacDonalds have recently offered thousands of new apprenticeships.

"They might be jobs, they might even be ok jobs," he complains, "but they aren't actually making anything. Who's going to make the money that we can spend in the supermarkets and fast food joints?"

It's a very familiar tale. Over the last four days I've seen some stunning examples of what is made in the west. Tomorrow world technology at Airbus. Astonishing planemaking at GKN. Solid belief in making everything here at Numatic international, and then Terry and his team crafting pumps for the world in the Forest of Dean. But you know what? It all hangs on skills. And it seems we are still desperately short of them.

Terry Slater, the SW Director of the Engineering Employers Federation, hears this every day.

"We have a real shortage of skilled people, even after a recession. If we don't tackle these challenges, the recovery is going to be slowed down, if it comes at all."

Made in Chard: The Somerset factory keeping it local

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 14:59:50 +0000

If there were three words that send a chill down most British manufacturing people, it's surely these.

"Made in China".

So when I heard that a Somerset firm had decided to bring some of its production back from the Far East, my ears pricked up.

Numatic are famous for one product, Henry the Vacuum Cleaner. (Don't say the other H word, whatever you do.)

There are other famous makers of domestic cleaning equipment in the west country of course, but they have long since moved their manufacturing to Asia. Britain, they argue, is where you do 'Design' and 'Research'.

When I phoned Andrew Smith, the manufacturing manager at Numatic, and asked him how much they make at their Chard factory, he laughed.
"Oh we're not just a screwdriver plant," he explained, "we make pretty much everything here."

The metal tubes are bent to shape. The big round drums that form Henry's body are moulded here. Even the little knob that winds the power cable back in is made from scratch in Chard.

The machines are undoubtedly cool. If you like machines, check out this video.

But why, I ask Andrew, do Numatic still make everything here?

"We don't only make Henry," he smiles. Their customers are large cleaning companies, based in Europe, America, the world. They don't want off-the-shelf kit. They want specialised equipment for specific cleaning contracts. Machines that sweep, wash and dry floors in one go for vast hotels and malls. Vacuums that suck hazardous industrial dust safely away. And everything with the cleaning firm's logo printed above the smile.

"We do over 5,000 different product lines," Andrew smiles, "and you can have any one of them in three weeks. We couldn't do that from the far east."

So that's their trick. Fast turnaround bespoke equipment. Yes, Henry is made in volume and shipped daily to the big stores, but every other cleaner is made to order.

A few parts are still bought in from other suppliers, notably the motors which come from an American firm, made to Numatic specifications. But recently Numatic has decided to bring six small parts back to Somerset from the current supplier in the far east. "We've been having problems with deliverytimes," he explains, "and really we can make it here just as cost effectively."

There are other surprising things here too. All the guys on the assembly line are on the same pay and grade. Their shifts vary from sticking Henry together, to feeding and checking the big plastic moulding machines, to running the robots that stick his happy smiling face on. They even do their own publicity in house, with a proper photographic studio next to the main production sheds.

When we had a sandwich, I wondered if someone in Building 5 had baked the bread.

And why Henry? Who thought up the smile?

Typically, it was almost an accident.

"We were at a trade show in Lisbon," recalls Andrew. "To be honest, things were a bit slow. One of the designers who was there doodled a smile on the red vacuum cleaner on the stall. That evening, the public came through - and the smiling cleaner was mobbed."

Back in Chard, they were just developing a new vacuum cleaner at the time. People seemed to like the funny smile, so they drew a proper one up ( in house, naturally).

When they took that to a big trade show in Scotland, it was a massive hit. And so the smiling cleaner's friend was born.

A tour of Numatic should be compulsory for all those pub bores who insist 'everything is made in China'. Not every firm can follow suit, they have established a reputation for speed and bespoke manufacturing with which Asia cannot compete. But there are others. Printers making fast turnaround books for the topical market, for example ( think X Factor Winner, Royal Wedding).

And tomorrow, I visit a firm that actually exports to Malaysia.

Carbon Fibre Wings: I have a go at making one by hand

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 09:10:27 +0000

You go to a lot of factories in this job.

Pie making plants, pump engineers, and, in this part of the world, a lot of plane factories.

The people that work there are always very courteous, and usually quite proud.

But they very rarely let you have a go yourself.

So imagine my surprise when the team who make carbon fibre wings for the brand new state-of-the-art Airbus lightweight passenger jet said yes.

This is one of the spars of the wing, essentially the backbone that keeps the wing, the plane and several hundred people in the air. That flimsy looking tape tumbling onto it is the raw material it is made from.

To make A out of B, you just lay the tape on a mould on the diagonal, then lay some more the other way, about 45 degrees to the first lot. Make sure there are no gaps or wrinkles, and then once you have about 100,000 metres of tape laid down, cook it at 180C.

It is, of course, harder than it sounds. In fact, having tried it, I think I would say it is impossible by hand. Especially since they want you to lay some parts of the spar thicker than others, to carry the load of the wings ribs. And other parts are a funny shape, to allow for the flexing designed by Filton's aerodynamics wizards.

If you fancy a laugh at my expense, watch me try and make one here.

Fortunately for the team at GKN, they have a machine. A very clever machine, worth £2.5m, which lays up the tape with perfect precision and astonishing speed.

This is the oven they cook the spars in. It gobbles up the 13 metre length like a snack, and then heats it to 180 degrees at ten times atmospheric pressure. Throughout, the spar is monitored and measured for every conceivable variable.

So, lots of fancy kit then. In fact the whole complex cost GKN Aerospace £170m. Two factories and 300 people, who by June will be turning out 13 finished wing sets a month, that's 78 of those spars with all the clever aileron technology that makes the plane fly already assembled.

For plane-heads in the Bristol area - and there are plenty of them of course - this is all heart-swelling stuff. But there's a bit more to it than pure pride.

This factory embodies two of the big lessons for British manufacturing.

First, the world can't get enough lightweight planes. With oil soaring, the new generation of carbon fibre wings, which cut fuel bills dramatically, are flying off the shelves before they're even made. Airbus has sold 538 of the new A350 aircraft already, and we're at least a year from seing one in the sky. Cost cutting, and Green, this is the perfect low carbon manufacturing, which is the hot ticket in manufacturing.

Second, this place would cost the same in China, India or Brazil. There are no discount merchants for that carbon fibre tape laying machine, or the giant autoclave.
Manufacturing that uses expensive equipment and highly skilled labour is much more resilient to global competition. This is what ministers mean by "the knowledge economy".

And you can't get round the machines with cheap labour. As I discovered, you just can't do this by hand. But I must thank Tony Wilson and his team for letting me try.

New from Airbus: A bike to transform Aerospace

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 17:13:10 +0000

Engineers are often not the world's best communicators. In my experience, many of them are happy to beaver away in their workshops, solving problems for the rest of us before we've even realised they were there.

Every day, at Filton's famous Aircraft Factory, engineers do astonishing things.
A few make headlines. The Box Kite, the Concord, the Brabazon, the A380 Superjumbo.

But I spend a lot of time looking at innovations that are, to the outside, baffling.

Which was why my ears pricked up when I heard about the Airbus Bike.

I've just finished making a documentary about it, but this morning they had it on BBC Breakfast News.

Two young engineers at the Innovation Works were so excited about a new machine they have, they decided to make a bike. Yes, two wheels, pedals, that kind of bike.

"You can show people satellite brackets, but they don't get it," explained one of them, Chris Turner. "My mum asks me about work, and I can show her brackets and stuff, but a bike - now that she understands."

It's a bit of a revelation this. Engineers who care that we understand.

Chris and his colleague Andy Hawkins have been working weekends on their pushbike. They want people to get as excited about ALM as they are, and they think the bike will do it.

ALM? Ah, the technology. Additive Layer Manufacturing.

It's basically quite simple. You take a 3D object, like a bike saddle, and slice it on computer into thousands of 2D layers. A pile of these layers will make a complete object. The clever bit is how they make their layers.

They start with this powder - nylon, in this case. Heated to 177 degrees C, it is about to melt. A laser traces the outline of the 2D shape, fusing the nylon solid.
Another layer, 0.1mm thick, and another laser.

Gradually, the object takes shape. Because it is encased in powder, you can create solid objects in space, in other words, moving parts. The bike would come out of the machine with ball-bearings already in place, a crank shaft that would turn, wheels that would spin, without any additional parts.

Sound simple? Well, I've been watching them for six weeks, and it was anything but.

The first attempt at creating the wheel hub went horribly wrong.

The measurements were out, by a few millimetres, and the bearings simply fell out.

But Chris and Andy understand communication so well, they knew they had to let us carry on filming. If things went wrong, their project would become a struggle we care about.

Typical engineers, they blustered about prototypes, and 'back to the drawing board', lessons learnt. Then, I asked Chris how it felt.

"It feels rubbish!" he laughed. "It feels like I really don't want that to happen again, I want to get back and make it work properly."

See, now you care about this technology, and whether they'll manage to make the bike work. To find out, just watch the film we made. It's on Inside Out West, which you can find here.

Meanwhile, a few thoughts about what ALM could do.

The real breakthrough is that ALM smashes the barrier between designer and manufacturing shop floor. You no longer have to design parts around what you can actually make, using lathes, casting, machining etc. Instead, the designer just draws on a 3D computer programme, and the ALM machine effectively prints it out.

In aerospace this means they can make wing parts with hollow truss structures built in, saving weight and material. They can create complex labyrinths of pipes for F1 engines that would be impossible the old way. Most of all, it means the designer is king again. And that, more than anything, is good news for the UK.

Increasingly, UK manufacturing has been going hi-tech, high value. Anything that you can make in a box is usually shipped in from the Far East. Companies like Dysons now design here, and manufacture 'over there'. But if design and manufacturing move closer together, British firms can hang on to a reason to be here.

So the factory that gave us Concorde and the Box Kite may yet transform British manufacturing, with a little nylon bicycle.

Green capital: can Bristol's eco-warriors finance the Big Society?

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 08:00:00 +0000

"This is an invitation to invest in a very unusual project. The returns are social, rather than financial."

Phil Haughton is making the pitch of his life. In the boardroom at Bristol's biggest investment house, Hargreaves Lansdown, he's trying to sell shares in a community-run organic farm.

"This is a chance for business to contribute to a project that will benefit the whole of society."

The city wizards listen attentively, and politely. I can only guess what they're thinking.

They look after £19.9 bn of people's money, and their job is simple. To make it grow. Saving the planet or feeding Chew Magna is not in the brochure.

But the share offer has done astonishingly well. It closes at midnight on Monday 31 Jan, and with two days to go, they already have £62,250 in the bank and another £22,750 pledged.

This is a "community benefit society", and if Mr Cameron's 'Big Society' is to mean anything, we should expect a lot more of them soon.

The idea is simple, but radical. Raise £100,000 from small investors. With it, buy an existing, profitable organic veg box scheme and the kit to farm the land. Then the Community Farm, as they call it, will grow veg for up to a thousand households. Any profits go back into the farm, and support an education centre.

"We've already had hundreds of people investing £50 or £100," Mr Haughton explains.

But why the need for an army of small investors, rather than a bank loan or city finance?

"We're trying to re-connect people with the land and how their food is produced," explains Mr Haughton's partner, Luke Hasell. He owns the land, which will be rented to the new business. "We hope the Community Farm will become a model for a new way of agriculture."

It's been described as the agricultural revolution in reverse.

Take a big farm, and share it out amongst the people who live around it. Have everyone come and help with the sowing and the harvest.

And for it to succeed, Bristol's eco-warriors must put their money where their mouths are.

For years now we've heard complaints about food miles, about global farming hurting the poor and cooking the planet. Campaigns against supermarkets are always popular in the west country. But until now, no-one has asked the green campaigners to invest their own cash in an alternative.

Nick Schofield

"I think it's a great opportunity, I really want to help this thing fly." Nick Schofield has put his money on the table. A retired teacher, I meet him out on the farm, pulling kale stalks out ready for the new season planting. Is this, I ask him, really an investment? Or is it actually a charitable donation?

"It's an investment, for sure. We need to get this off the ground, and it's a lovely thing, to grow veggies locally and get everyone involved."

The army of volunteers will help solve a practical problem. Growing a wide range of veg to fill a box scheme is hard, on a small farm. You either need lots of expensive kit, or lots of labour. Bringing people back on the land is not only revolutionary, it's also cost-effective. But there is more to it than that.

"Working with people breaks down all those barriers," explains Phil Haughton. "We're engaging a huge diversity of people here. People are hungry for a change now, they can see the world is broken, food security is a massive concern. Just this week the UN warned that we may not be able to feed ourselves in 30 years. This is one little project that says, here's another way of doing things."

So, were the money men at Hargreaves Lansdown convinced? They hear a dozen pitches a day in the boardroom, but they've never heard a sell like this one.

"I'm not sure this is really an investment," says Ben Yearsley, Head of Investor Relations. "You might like the local production, the whole food supply thing, but that's a different argument. I don't see where the returns are."

Mark Dampier, the firm's head of research, takes a slightly different view. "I think it's a good idea, but I'm unhappy with this phrase 'not for profit'. It suggests profit is a dirty word, and it's not. I don't see why you shouldn't run a good company, sell me healthy fresh veg, and make a profit. If I invest, I want to see a return."

If the conventional funds won't back schemes like this, they must rely on alternatives. Already one ethical fund has committed £19,000 to the farm.

Across Bristol, the networks are buzzing as the deadline looms.

Will Bristol's eco-warriors back the farm? Come back here for updates from Tuesday morning.... or read more on their site here.

What do you think of alternative finance like this? Would you invest your own money in a social enterprise, where the aims are to make a better world, not a bigger dividend?
Update Tues 1 Feb 08:00
The farm has now signed up over 200 investors and reached £96,000. It's thought this is the largest single amount of capital raised in a share offer for a community agriculture project. The board has also extended the deadline for new investors, which they are allowed to do under the rules. It is now open until Feb 10.

Can Bristol weather the storm? Go figure...

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 18:10:00 +0000

Sometimes a number tells a story. As Bristolians wonder what 2011 has in store for them, some number-crunchers may have a story to tell.

It’s not a bad story. In fact, parts of it make quite cheery reading for Bristolians, at least in comparison to other cities round the country.

The storytellers work for an outfit for the Centre for Cities. They take all the numbers produced by Britain’s ten biggest cities, and crunch them to death.

In words, they say things like this:

“Cities such as Bristol and Edinburgh are well positioned … to build on their diverse industrial base and high skills levels…”.

But I prefer the numbers.

Numbers like 74.2, 17 and 32.4.

There, I knew that would get the pulses racing.

What story do these numbers tell?

74.2 is the percentage of Bristolians, of working age, in work.

We often talk about unemployment numbers, but it is working people who will bring the UK out of prosperity. And when the Centre for Cities drew up a table, guess who’s at the top of it?

This is a table on which you want to be at the top.

Here's one where you want to be firmly towards the bottom.

It shows how much cash in a city comes from welfare.

17 is Bristol's second special number. You can find it second from bottom in this table. Only Edinburgh gets less of its cash as a welfare handout.

Some of these numbers are jaw-dropping. Did you realise a quarter of Merseyside’s total income started out as a benefit cheque? Astonishing.

Clearly, with benefits being squeezed, cities that draw more cash from welfare will be squeezed too. So Bristol has a little more insulation. Its shopkeepers and hairdressers can relax just a little, knowing that fewer of their customers depend on benefits.

So much for two numbers. Bristol has more people working, and fewer claiming.

Are you asking why yet?

The answer, in a number, is 32.2.

What on earth is that? It’s the percentage of Bristolians with high level qualifications ( NVQ 4 or above).

In Birmingham that number is 22.4%. In Gloucester, it is even lower – just 18.8%.

It means more people work in places like this, Filton's aircraft factory, than in many other cities. And so they are better paid. And their businesses are more likely to grow, less likely to be beaten just on price.

So, Bristolians are better educated, more likely to be in work, and less dependent on welfare.

In words, the Centre for Cities puts it like this.

“Buoyant cities like Leeds and Bristol, which have been fast-growing and have lots of private sector jobs, are best placed to lead the UK’s recovery.”

Stories with words often have a twist at the end. So here’s a number twist.

3,100

That’s the number of jobs likely to go in Newport, just across the water, as public sector cuts take effect. The calculation was done by clever chaps at the Office of National Statistics, based in, erm, Newport. 1,700 people work there, and they face a 50% cut themselves.

So they should know.

Scrambling to survive: Egg Farmers caught by new Euro rules

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:55:22 +0000

Does this look cruel to you?

Four hens to a small cage, standing all their lives. For many, battery hens became the first battle of the ethical food war. But for Pete Wood, who runs this small family egg farm in the Chew Valley, it was a case of ignorant townies missing the point.

“I think Free Range Eggs won’t last,” he tells me. “They’ll fall victim to disease, just like they did in the 60s. That’s how the cages came in; you put the birds in cages, the disease disappears overnight.”

A caged bird, in other words, is a safe bird. Safe from all but two of her pecking companions, safe from foxes, most of all safe from diseases like red mite which can run through a free range flock like wildfire.

“But but but but!” I can hear you shouting at your computer.

“They can’t flap!”
“They can’t scratch!”
“They have to stand on sloping chicken wire all their lives!”
It could be the cry of any hen lover, free range farmer or just casual fan of Aardman’s Chicken Run movie. In fact, these are the words of Joyce D’Silva, a campaigner with Compassion in World Farming.

It’s an argument that’s already run for 25 years, and shows no sign of stopping.
But Pete Wood, and thousands of egg farmers in the West Country and beyond, have lost.

Next year, his cages will be illegal. Across Europe, conventional cages will be banned from Jan 1 2012.

Not that this will see every bird running free across the Chew Valley or the Mendips or the Cotswolds. No, there are new cages, licenced by Europe. They have much more space, take 60 birds each, and have creature comforts.

Perches.
Nestboxes, like this one in the picture.
Even plastic scratching areas.

But they’re expensive. Pete Wood has been quoted £250,000 for one henhouse. He has four, and his farm is small. One egg man I spoke to in North Dorset has shelled out £10m for his “enriched colony”.

So what? I hear you cry. It’s the price of progress, and when bearbaiting was outlawed, people lost work.

What really irks farmers like Mr Wood is the belief that other European nations won’t be as law-abiding as the UK. Already France and Spain have asked for a ‘derogation’ for two years. Animal welfare experts believe inspection will be light. And eggs from these hens will compete with Mr Wood’s eggs in the British market.

So far, it’s the usual story of British farmers having to follow new Euro laws to the letter, while their Mediterranean competitors shrug them off.

But there’s more to eggs than, erm, eggs.

A quarter of the eggs we ate last year, some 2.6 billion eggs, went into processing.
Cakes, meringues, sponges, mayonnaise, dips; think about it, eggs are everywhere.

Another third, over three billion eggs, were eaten in restaurants, cafes, and B&Bs. When you last stopped for an egg and bacon roll, or woke up to the full English on a weekend away, did you ask for free range?

If Mr Wood is right, the Great British Breakfast might soon feature Spanish eggs alongside the Danish bacon.

Understandably, many farmers are now ditching cages altogether. Down the road near Wincanton, I meet Dan Wood, who has decided to go 100% free range.

“That’s the way our market is going,” he explains to me, “more and more shops want local, free range eggs they can trust. So that’s what we’ll do; we’re businessmen in the end, and free range provides a clear market to work in.”

It’s a familiar story. Go upmarket, sell quality free range eggs to the local, independent shops and farmers can stay ahead. But if they try and play the global market, Britain’s increasing welfare standards may price them out altogether.

Tears and Tesco: the changing face of the High St

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 17:43:59 +0000

Why do people cry when they close down a shop?
Is it a business, or a love affair?

Colin Zabel has not gone bust. He has not lost his home. His two shop assistants have both found new jobs. But as he packs up the last of the stock from his chemist and general store in Swindon's old town, he can't hold back the tears.

"It's much more than a business," he explains, wiping an eye, "it's a way of life."

Mr Zabel has been on Wood Street for 14 years and now the lease has expired. These things are complicated, as ever, but suffice to say the shopkeeper and his landlord have parted company. He is already looking for new premises, and a new enterprise.

"Shopkeepers will be okay," he says, "but the community is left with an empty shop. Or worse, yet another restaurant."

He tells me that many of his regulars are old, infirm, disabled. A short nip down the road to pick up some new buttons and a ball of wool is what they want. And they get a friendly chat into the bargain. "If we ran this place on purely commercial lines, we'd have gone bust years ago."

When Colin leaves, it's likely that TopDrug will become part of the next door curry restaurant. And that, it turns out, is typical.

In the first six months of 2010, 519 new restaurants, takeaways or pubs opened in the South West. That's more than one in four of all new openings on our high streets. There's more on the new analysis here.

The research by the Local Data Company was commissioned for BBC One's regional current affairs series Inside Out. You can see my take on it in the West Country edition at 7:30pm on Monday, 6 December, but there are similar reports in all of the English Regions reflecting what's happening on local High Streets. You can also watch on the BBC iPlayer.

The "death of the high street" is a frequently reported tragedy. But, to quote Mark Twain, its death has been rather exaggerated. I've been inspecting the health of local shopping streets across the West Country, and I found something rather surprising.

They've not died. They've just changed. In fact, they've never stopped changing.

Out go multiple chain retailers, especially of clothing and electricals. In come cafes, delis, hairdressers, nail bars. In a word: services.

Round the corner from Mr Zabel's TopDrug is a road that provides TV cameras with the desired images of "recession Britain". On Victoria Road I counted 25 units. Nine are empty, in fact derelict. Look at them.

But who is trading well here? Five restaurants and four hair and beauty salons.
An accountant, a thriving dentist, a man who engraves gravestones. Services.

There are only two true retailers, who actually sell things, but in fact they are really services too. Ann Farthing's lovely antique shop and Wiltshire Rod & Gun, a mecca for field sports from across the county. In both, you buy expertise, personal service, and a nice chat.

I found the same picture everywhere. It is most striking in Frome, a cornucopia of independent shops. Of 275 stores in Frome, only 40 are multiples.

"These people have realised you don't compete with the multiples, you provide something different," explains retail analyst Mike McElhinney of King Sturge.

There are unique fashion designers, I count four haberdasheries, two hand made cosmetics boutiques, several second hand bookstores and countless jewellers.

"They have passion, creativity, flair," says Mr McElhinney. "They are running shops the multiples could never open."

Back in Swindon, Colin Zabel is still tearful.
"When Wood Street is the street of bars, where will the old people go then?" he laments.

They say you shouldn't argue with the dead, so it seems wrong to question a man who is shutting up shop. But right next door I pop into a hardware store, run by an enthusiastic chap who says times are tough, but perfectly profitable.

As we chat, a woman comes in with a long face. Her oven has gone on the blink.
"Its flashing red, says 'change filter', and I didn't even know it had a filter," she tells him. In a flash, her local ironmonger has identified the make of oven and whipped out the right filter from a mysterious box behind the counter.

"A fiver for that, if you would. Come back if you get stuck fitting it!"

Everyone has a local shopping street. And everyone has an opinion on whether it is going to the dogs, being ruined by out of town superstores, or actually becoming rather pleasant.

What's it like round your way?

Burger Bars and Barber Shops: The future of our High Streets

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 17:52:53 +0000

I'm walking down the Fishponds Rd in Bristol, just by Lodge Causeway. If you're feeling hungry, there are plenty of takeaways.

Six in fact, out of 33 shops.

But buy your own food? Some fresh chicken, a bag of spuds and some broccoli? Forget it. The old greengrocers has gone, replaced by the "Family Kebab House". There was a bakery too once, long gone now.

What's happened to our local High Streets?

As luck would have it, I've got the just the man with me. Ned Cussen grew up round here, and now trades shops for one of Bristol's busiest agencies, King Sturge.
"Neighbourhood shopping like this has been most affected," he tells me.

"And this street is typical: takeaways, hair dressers, service industries. It's actually a fairly narrow range of businesses that can still work in shops like that."

And look at that. Right next door is a hairdressers, "New Look" Indian style threading and beauticians. In fact, there are eight different ways to get your hair done here, all the way through to Remo's Turkish Shaves.

"It's quite simple," Ned points out, "you can't get your hair cut on the internet."

That, of course, is the threat. This weekend is reputed to be a frenzy of online Christmas shopping. Real shopkeepers, hoping their customers will brave the freezing weather, expect the worst. Out of town centres and big malls are the other, much documented, threat. Some say our local High Streets are in terminal decline.

"Well, step in here," suggests Ned with a smile.

He takes me into a sport shop, started in the sixties by Bristol Rovers star Doug Hillard. Doug was Ned's boyhood hero, "a Doug Hillard free kick was a wonder to behold," he smiles.

Inside, we meet Doug's widow, Janet. They've survived four decades of retail revolutions. And as we look round, it is clear why.

You can buy a single stud. Trophies with your friendly league club logo embossed on them. They'll even embroider or print team strips.

"Most sports shops are actually selling fashion, when you look at them," Ned explains. "The big ones at the malls, they might do you a Manchester United shirt, but not Mangotsfield United like you can get here!"

In fact, Doug Hillard's shop is now a service business too. They're selling expertise, attention to detail, and printed caps.

Wander down your local high street, and play the game. Count the number of shops selling things. Then count the service firms. And I bet the shops that are surviving are really selling a service too.

On Monday we'll get some new research analysing which shops are closing, which are opening, and where. I wonder if Ned and I are on the money here?

Can Somerset really turn back time?

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 17:07:52 +0000

Shepton Mallet is throwing a party. There will be music, market stalls, a hog roast. Why? Well, in the teeth of the recession, the town's little shops are booming.

The High St butcher's been re-opened, just across from Devlin's the brand new family bakery. You wouldn't believe this, but behind the copper kettles and brass bells of S Grant-Jones the Ironmongers, they'll even forge you a candlestick.

Who says the recession has decimated town centres? Who's afraid of the big bad retail park? Not with Sergison's Grocery selling Angelica by the ounce.

OK, we're in fantasy land. Not completely mind, this is a television fantasy. In a massive social experiment, BBC One re-opened family shops in Shepton, fitted them out with period props and the brought real shopkeepers from across Britain to run them. They call it "Turn Back Time", and it certainly feels lifelike.

"This is unbelievably hard," puffs Karl Sergison, the grocer. "I don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days." In 2010, Mr Sergison is a real shopkeeper, running a deli in Lincolnshire with his wife Debbie. For him, taking part in the TV experiment was a dream come true.

"The Victorian grocer was the hub of the community," he says on the programme, "it would be nice to get that sense of community back."

In Shepton, that's a popular view. With the inevitable retail park at the top of town, the high street has been decimated. Dozens of shops lie empty, their windows whitewashed. The TV company had the pick of the place when they looked for new premises. Then, for six weeks in the summer filming, the town buzzed with excitement.

Every week, a new era. From Edwardian toy shops to a Seventies Milk Bar, the town's shoppers were in retail heaven. Mandy McKenna loved it.

"My kids thought it was the best ever," she tells me. "Specially the Milk Bar." It was more than just getting stuff, this was shopping as community, as entertainment, as life.

So, when the stardust fades and the TV trucks roll on, can Shepton do it for real?

Mandy's giving it a go. With a friend she's taken a lease on the old dressmaker - and has just opened a new place called WooHoos, selling glorious vintage. It's very now.

I'm impressed she and Zoe have got it together, in the few weeks since filming ended.

"We already had some gear we sell online, and Zoe has a shop in Bruton," she tells me. But although online sales are good, "people feel more comfortable buying from a firm with a physical shop, a real place to go."
Now there's an insight into the new world of e-commerce.

There's talk of the Milk Bar being re-opened too, it was such a hit, maybe by a community group as a not-for-profit enterprise.

So far, it feels like a party. Loads of good feeling, energy, music and a hog-roast. But can Shepton really beat off the clone town formulas that have claimed so many towns?

Can these funky new shops make a living? It could be every bit as hard as making Victorian bread and Edwardian butter.

A Frenchman in Filton: Louis Gallois opens new Airbus centre

Dave Harvey (BBC News) — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 15:13:59 +0000

Sometimes you need a foreign visitor to make you appreciate home grown talent.

My friends from Bordeaux who marvel at our Somerset Cider heritage. The Hollywood animators who can't believe Wallace and Gromit are not painted on every Bristol street corner.

So it was at Filton this morning, when Louis Gallois dropped in to Airbus' state-of-the-art aircraft factory.

M. Gallois is Chief Exec of EADS, the parent company of Airbus. He is, as the assembled engineers were chuckling to me, a "Grand Fromage". He was here to open the new test facility for the Landing Gear on the next generation of Airbus passenger jets, the A350 family. But what was striking was his praise for British engineers.

"We have decided to open here because of your outstanding engineering capacity," he said. "You should not be shy of your achievements, you are world leaders at what you do."

Now I hear a lot of these speeches, and of course you would expect the boss to praise his staff on a red letter day like this.

But what struck me was his absolutely automatic assumption that Wings and Landing Gear mean Filton and Gloucestershire.

"All of our wings are designed and developed here," he shrugged. "The Landing Gear is from Messier Dowty in Gloucestershire, of course, and will be tested in Filton."

When I asked him if they had considered building the £40m landing gear test centre in Spain or France, he looked dumbstruck. I might as well have asked if they'd thought of hiring an American chef instead of a Frenchman.

"The experience, competence, capability of British engineers is unsurpassed in these two fields."

Nice words then, for the Filton faithful. Airbus is of course a pan-European project, so people often get twitchy that the mother-ship might decide to move some vital work from the UK to Spain, or France, or Germany.

"We are employing 16,500 people directly in the UK," chided M Gallois, "135,000 indirect jobs depend on our work. That is 2,000 more than in 2001."

Of course there is a shadow over the party. Next week Dr Liam Fox will reveal the defence cuts he plans to make as his contribution to the Deficit Reduction Programme.

Airbus military flagship, the A400M cargo plane, seems to have survived, and certainly M Gallois and his advisors looked confident this morning. But EADS also has Eurofighter, Eurocopter, other military products. Will the defence wing of the giant firm find itself shrinking just as the civilian wing is flying high?

"All I ask the governments is that they do not cut back on Research and Development." M Gallois told me. He understands that military manufacturing does not exist in a silo. And the plane we were talking about today was a perfect example.

The A350 is the first mostly carbon-fibre passenger plane Airbus have made. And the A400M is, if you like, its military sister. Both programmes have had to re-invent engineering, as the carbon fibre composite material reacts totally differently to aluminium. Clearly, lessons learned on one enrich the other.

Today, the Airbus supremo was confident of the schedule. A350, he insists, will make its first flight in 2012, and will be flying passengers by 2013. Airlines around the globe have already bought 550 of them, so he'd better be right.

But what about the next plane? Will Filton's design engineers be supported by contracts from our own government as enthusiastically as they are by this French chief executive? We have only a week or so to wait.

Meanwhile, here's a picture of the new A350 model, right in front of a replica of the Bristol Fighter, rebuilt by Filton Apprentices.