Car Industry Tells The Tale.

Honda has today announced 800 redundancies at its plant in Swindon. The reason is that car sales have fallen in Europe by as much as 1 million units. This, you might think, is to be expected against the background of continued recession, high unemployment and lower wages across the continent. Demand is bound to suffer under such circumstances. However, the contrast between Honda and other manufacturers such as Jaguar, Land Rover and Bentley couldn't be more stark. The sale of luxury cars is actually climbing. Good news for them and those that work for them, but what does it tell us about the economy as a whole? Put simply the rich are getting richer and are shrugging off the effects of the recession as if it doesn't exist while the poor are getting poorer and are struggling to pay day-to-day bills. Why is this? Because governments across Europe, with a few exceptions, are determined that the poor must pay for the mistakes of the wealthy. The greatest exception has been France where taxes on the rich have been put up to 75%. But what hs been the result? Gérard Depardieu has quit his country and taken out Russian citizenship simply to avoid paying taxes, proving quite conclusively that for people like him patriotism is well and truly dead. David Cameron has already laid out Britain's stall when it comes to inviting the Gallic greedy and selfish to cross the Channel and take up residence here. But then what would you expect from a country where Bentley sales are rising while the sale of Hondas is collapsing. That says it all really.