"Britain is Open for Business" (part 2)

Continuing on from part 1

“Britain is open for business.” this is a phrase that comes up again and again in the media, either as a cliché from journalists or a direct soundbite from an MP. It is usually linked to economic reports that show growth in the UK economy, or a piece of legislation that makes international trade easier (or less regulated) is going ahead. The emphasis is that the UK is a company and that that company is profitable. ...

This is where I start to really stretch the metaphor. I want you to picture an actual physical marketplace: perhaps your town has an indoor market or a weekly produce market. I'll be keeping St George's Market in Belfast in mind throughout this. Now lets start thinking about what makes a good market and how that applies to national economics. Just trust me and go along for the ride.

Safe and secure

A good market is somewhere where stall holders can leave their merchandise overnight and be relatively confident that it will still be there in the morning. During trading they don't expect to experience much in the way of stock loss, or other significant crime. They know that, should something be stolen or they are assaulted or any other crime is committed that market staff and security will help deal with the issue appropriately.

The same goes for people visiting a market. They don't want to be mugged, or pick-pocketed. They don't want to be harassed or assaulted. They don't want to have a stall-holder overcharge them, refuse to give them change or steal their bank details (it's 2015, markets have card readers). Should anything happen we want to be sure that security or the police are involved, that our complaints are listened to with care and diligence and that appropriate measures will be taken. In the case of a stall-holder committing a crime against a customer that may be a criminal charge but it may also include a ban on future trading.

The UK market place has a police force, a criminal justice system and a legislature that includes dozens of regulating bodies, especially when you start taking in to account local authorities. Now I was raised to be fairly pro police and I have to say, by and by that confidence remains. I am aware however, that for certain groups of people and for certain crimes, policing and justice aren't always carried out fairly. Young black men for example are more likely to be stopped and searched than any other group. In fact racism in the UK criminal system is well reported and documented if you want to go and read about it. In more recent years this has extended to Asian men, and people who are not UK nationals. There are also certain crimes which are not treated with the sensitivity or even handedness they should be: rape and sexual assault have some shocking statistics regarding how many cases are taken to trial, how many end in prosecution and the length of prison sentences handed down. Rape is also one of the few crimes were the burden of proof falls so heavily on the shoulders of the victims and there is an uphill struggle to even convince police that a crime has been committed. Policing and justice is clearly not as fair and even as it could be.

Then there are other parts of the legislature: banking regulation, taxation, welfare and social security, wage and employment law, immigration law (relating to the above section on diversity) which are skewed to benefit a very small percentage of the population and to cripple the rest. To shun, marginalise, refuse to help and at times actively hurt large parts of your market in order to benefit a small few. Is that actually leading to a successful market or is that leading to a market which can't be sustained whilst a few stallholders walk away smiling (with the credit card details of their unrepresented customers).

“Britain is Open For Business” (part 1)

In which I stretch a metaphor as far as possible.

 “Britain is open for business.” this is a phrase that comes up again and again in the media, either as a cliché from journalists or a direct soundbite from an MP. It is usually linked to economic reports that show growth in the UK economy, or a piece of legislation that makes international trade easier (or less regulated) is going ahead. The emphasis is that the UK is a company and that that company is profitable.

I have issues with this premise and consequently, every time that hackneyed line is rolled out I find myself on the phone ranting to somebody, usually my poor beleaguered father. In my opinion, expecting a country, even a western capitalist country like the UK, to function as a business is fundamentally wrong. It is this drive for profit, for pleasing investors and stakeholders and putting coffers ahead of people that leads to spending cuts, service cuts, privatisation, right wing and socially conservative rhetoric. When your key measure of success is how “healthy” the bank balance is, all sorts of other markers will be ignored.

“Britain Open for Business” means that we treat the country as a business and the populace as workers with no real function other than to serve the profit of the country. If the profit margins are not big enough then the workers, us, the citizens, will be sacrificed as cuts are made in the name of efficiency.

But is profit, economic growth and a national bank balance really the best or only way of measuring the success of a nation? In short, no it isn't. So let's examine this metaphor.

Being open for business, a nation trading as a company is based in free market economics, the very backbone of western capitalist government. It is nice and neat to think about the country as a single business entity that opens its doors, trades and then balances the books at the end of the day. However, that's not how a market works. Not a money market, not the stock market, not a traditional farmer's market. It's also not how the country works. Whatever the size and scope of a market there are many different elements that can dictate its success or failure. If a CEO or board member of a FTSE company is exposed in a drug scandal, the company’s shares will take a knock and the whole balance of trading on the stock market might shift. Yet recreational cocaine use has little to do with product quality or unit sales?

So instead of thinking in terms of a country as a single business, why not think of it in terms of the market as a whole being ready for business. The UK itself is a marketplace, and actually, that's what economists really mean when they make this statement. The UK as a place were other countries and international companies can feel confident trading. Where people and their businesses will be happy to spend their money and in doing so will enrich the UK.

This is where I start to really stretch the metaphor. I want you to picture an actual physical marketplace: perhaps your town has an indoor market or a weekly produce market. I'll be keeping St George's Market in Belfast in mind throughout this. Now lets start thinking about what makes a good market and how that applies to national economics. Just trust me and go along for the ride.