Defence of the car manufacturers’  loan guarantee package

On BBC i-player you can listen to a 10-minute interview with Lord Peter Mandelson on the Radio 5 ‘Drive’ programme this evening; after opening this link move the ‘fast forward’ cursor towards the bottom left of the screen from the 0.00 time to 2.14.30 to find the start of the interview. Lord Mandelson defends the measures to help the automotive industry which he announced today against criticism that the measures won’t go far enough to help the suppliers of car manufacturing, or the jobs which are being lost right now throughout the industry, and that other industries may be equally deserving of help to survive the recession.

He focuses on the need to ‘build a bridge to the future’ and make it possible for manufacturers to invest in producing new models and technologies for the ‘increasingly low carbon market for cars’, looking at creating the climate for new British models to have a competitive advantage in the market when the recession ends, giving a supply-side justification for the government spending. It would be a good idea to listen to it and evaluate the strength of the economic arguments he gives, and consider his statement at the end that ‘…the brave new future for the car industry has already begun.’ More green shoots for British industry?