The decline of the British tyre industry - Newcastle University

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while the NEDO sought a new chairman and a new consensus around which to re-establish the committee. In the meantime, the Employee Involvement Programme was dropped from the agenda. The AUEW’s position was determined by the opposition of the craft workers at Dunlop to the Involvement Programme. The craftsmen were angry over the imposition of new working practices at Dunlop’s Washington plant, and concerned about the proposed changes at Fort Dunlop. Perhaps, if John Miller, the senior union official on the SWP, and an advocate of ‘efficiency dialogues’ had been present at the meeting, he may have been able to persuade the trade unions to maintain their support for the Involvement Programme. 94 He saw the initiative as a way of extending the bargaining power of the trade unions. The chairman, John Cousins, was also a strong supporter of ‘efficiency dialogues’. The Secretary of the SWP and his support staff from the Manpower and Industrial Relations division saw ‘efficiency dialogues’ as a means of establishing consensus at the plant level. 95 These principal actors had pushed participation much further than was palatable for other committee members. Furthermore, the economic and political climate had changed since the inception of ‘efficiency dialogues’. The new Conservative Government had no commitment to its predecessor’s Industrial Strategy and, of course, the tyre sector was in decline. Policy constraints A major weakness of the Birmingham conference was the absence of the vehicle manufacturers, and the delegates’ failure to consider the impact of the motor industry on tyre production. The decline of the British motor industry was not discussed in Birmingham. 96 It was not until 1979 when Britain had become a net importer of cars that the relevance of the vehicle industry to tyre production was given any serious consideration by the SWP. It appears extraordinary that a strategy for the tyre industry was not discussed in the context of a strategy for the vehicle industry. A motor industry EDC was set up in 1967, but it held its last meeting in 1971. The Motor Industry Tripartite Group was established in 1976 outside of the NEDO
structure, but it soon became moribund. 97 The motor manufacturers saw little benefit in tripartite discussions. There was never any prospect of devising a strategy for the entire motor and components industry. The tyre conference confirmed how far the SWP was operating in a policy vacuum. The major policy issues facing the SWP were the slump in British tyre production, rising imports and job losses. The papers prepared for the committee focused on international competitiveness. Hence, policy prescriptions were biased towards this aspect of efficiency: the need to raise productivity and reduce costs. There was little analysis of the other factors such as investment and production and sourcing strategies which contributed to the sector’s decline. In 1980 SRI International was commissioned to conduct an independent assessment of the prospects for the British tyre industry. 98 The consultants recommended that strategy should be based on the ability to win a larger share of the European and other markets by taking into account: market growth rates; capacity constraints; investment intentions and sourcing policies; and the international competitiveness of the British producers based on output, productivity, production costs and exchange rate movements. The NEDO used the report to prepare two policy papers on ‘The future of the UK tyre industry’ 99 and ‘Forecasts of markets and manpower requirements’. 100 The companies responded through the BRMA to leave the NEDO in no doubt that ‘the manufacturers have some doubts about the value of producing strategy papers of this kind, relating as they do to a national tyre industry strategy as opposed to a company strategy’. 101 The producers did not see a strategic role for the SWP beyond acting as a communications channel for the employers in their dealings with the government and the trade unions. Previous studies revealed that managers attended SWP meetings because it presented ‘an additional opportunity for business to influence government policies’. 102 The tyre companies regarded the SWP as relatively unimportant compared to the BRMA, the industry’s main vehicle for discussions with the government. The SWP did perform one important function for the rubber companies. With the demise of the industry’s National Joint Industrial Council, it was the only forum where the employers could meet with
Page 1 and 2: Discussion Papers in Management and
Page 3 and 4: According to McKay and Grant the im
Page 5 and 6: institutional constraints that impa
Page 7 and 8: weight of throughput per man hour)
Page 9 and 10: The SWP proposed a two-pronged atta
Page 11 and 12: productivity (productivity index) f
Page 13 and 14: None of the voluntary targets were
Page 15: Professor Bain found that Dunlop ha
Page 19 and 20: prepared to discuss common problems
Page 21 and 22: Bhaskar, Krish. The Future of the U
Page 23 and 24: 1983. NEDO. Industrial Strategy. Re
Page 25 and 26: 10 Grant, “Government,” 101. 11
Page 27 and 28: 61 Ibid, 7. 62 Ibid, 8. 63 NEDO, Th
Page 29 and 30: 119 Wilks, Industrial Policy, 268.

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