Ford grapples with UK exchange rate
US car giant Ford has this evening announced plans to increase the cost of new cars in the UK by an average of 4% amid concerns over the exchange rate. This is the third increase in the price of Ford motors over the last few months and has prompted significant criticism from UK consumers. This comes at a time the UK government is still basking in the glory of the car scrapping scheme which appears to have increased business levels in the sector since it began.
There is no doubt that the demise of General Motors just a few days ago perfectly illustrates the difficulties being felt in the car manufacturing industry on a worldwide and UK basis. We also saw the collapse of LDV and there are concerns that the ongoing bailout of General Motors Europe is in trouble. Obviously Ford would rather have retained a lower pricing strategy for its UK division but with sterling starting to strengthen against the US dollar the company was fighting a losing battle.
While the car scrappage scheme has injected some business into the sector there is no doubt that the general sale of new cars is significantly lower now than when the economic downturn began. Sector funding is stretched, employees are struggling with no increase in salaries and redundancy levels continue to rise.
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