Wednesday, 01 February 2012 00:00
A blog from our Chairman
It seems that now, at the beginning of 2012, the whole world is hanging on to a very odd commodity, confidence, and nobody seems to want to display it.
Recent comments on the world economy say that debt is at a higher level now than after World War Two. Times after WW2 were austere, but then we had a world where lives, businesses and towns had been physically destroyed. Although a lot of rebuilding was needed there was massive debt, materials were short, food was short and the communications infrastructure was badly damaged. The result of all this was that rebuilding took an awfully long time.
In fact I designed a building to go into the last bombsite in Bristol (Now Amelia Court in Pipe Lane) as late as 1989, nearly half a century after the bomb, dropped at night on to the middle of a city, had destroyed a medieval terrace in the centre of Bristol. Today we don’t have those problems, lots of people still have money, communications are fantastic, commodity prices are falling, even fuel prices are falling, we also know how to build fuel efficient vehicles and buildings so that running them is getting cheaper and cheaper.
We also have a housing and building shortage, but hardly anyone wants to commission things. Oddly enough, Stride Treglown is busy, upmarket housing is happening, food retail is strong, stuff is still happening in all areas of education, but fee levels are desperately competitive and we wouldn’t mind making a bit of money at some stage in the future.
We are told that most big businesses have more cash than they know what to do with because, instead of spending profits, they are simply sitting on them. Most businesses are also making money, having slimmed down their workforce, sold off their stocks and shut down unprofitable lines. We are all waiting for somebody to say, actually it’s all over, you can spend money again but instead, every time you pick up a newspaper or tune in a radio somebody is there saying there’s much more gloom on the way.
I think it’s about time we started praising people who create jobs, get businesses going and actually roll their sleeves up and get on with it.
My business, and those of many of my clients would have disappeared three years ago had we allowed RBS to disappear and yet the chap who took on the nasty job of turning around and ailing bank, 81% owned by the government, is being denied a bonus that was written into his contract when he took the job on. RBS (the peoples bank) made £2bn profit in the third quarter of last year and employs over 175,000 people. Go on! Give the man his money, stop whingeing and start talking about good things again.
Its good to see that Rolls Royce sold more cars last year than at any time in their history but somehow, apart from a few wealthy people, the confidence just is not there. Start praising and rewarding people a lot more, maybe that will bring back some confidence and get us all back to full production again.
Bob Whittington, Chairman, Stride Treglown Ltd.
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