Jaguar Land Rover’s chief financial officer has admitted that if the UK “crashes out” of the EU with no deal, it would cost the firm £500 million per year in tariffs on vehicle exports alone.
Autocar found the remarks in a record of a meeting between Adrian Mardell and investment banks at the end of January. Mardell said he “fully expects” the current transition period to last until 1 January 2021, after which there will be “a different relationship”.
Mardell also said: “We’ve gone through two versions of potential crash-outs already, in the end of March [2019] and the end of October, and what we did was to protect ourselves by closing the plant for a week.
“We’ll decide at the back end of this calendar year whether that’s an appropriate measure. If we do crash out, if we go to WTO [World Trade Organization rules]… it’s about a £500m duty hit – £40m a month.”
It’s rare for a senior figure at a major car maker to quantify the cost of a no-deal Brexit and resultant use of WTO rules. But Mardell also reckons that if the UK does find itself in this situation, it won’t be for long.
“I don’t personally believe that we’d really be at those WTO levels for a significant period of time,” he said. “I think it would be a negotiating position which is negotiated away by one side or the other. I’m much more relaxed about it than I would have been two years ago, actually.”
JLR has now furloughed around 50% (20,000) of its non-critical workers during the coronavirus crisis, although it’s paying 100% of their salaries this month. Board-ranking executives have deferred their salary payments for three months, with CEO Ralf Speth’s pay being reduced by 30%.
The pandemic has had a significant effect on already-falling sales, too. The latest figures for the 2019/2020 financial year reveal JLR sold 508,659 vehicles, down 12.1% on the same period the year before. A more significant dent was made in the last financial quarter, between January and March, with sales down 30.9% year on year to 108,869.
The figures vary between brands. Jaguar’s sales took a particular hammering, down 22% overall in the year and 42.6% in the last quarter, at 28,288. Land Rover, by comparison, was down 7.7% and 25.6% respectively, selling 81,581 cars in the last quarter.
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Just been announced, they
Keyboard Government.
Lots of interesting posts on this highly charged subject, yet, nobody has an answer?,I do wish politics didn't spit apart on a web page which is to talk about cars, but too seriously about cars, especially at the moment.
Peter Cavellini wrote:
should have read....lots of interesting posts on this highly charged subject, yet, nobody has an answer? , I do wish politics didn't split us apart on a web page which is to talk about cars, but not too seriously, especially at the moment.
Well said
Well said Peter. There is enough bitterness and division in our country without it spilling over into this forum. Most of us are pretty fed up being restricted in our movements and unable to enjoy any motoring beyond the excitement of a weekly trip to Sainsbury's. The team at Autocar are making a terrific effort to keep our spirits up so let's not spoil things by regurgitating the arguments that however we voted now have to be put behind us. Would the moderators at Autocar please remove any posts that are likely to be politically controversial.
Looks like this will be the
sbagnall wrote:
those last few words you couldn’t help posting confirm the sort of person you are. Your views and opinions on anything are therefore completely worthless
we can all have a view mate
we can all have a view mate just saying its bad news