While Rolls-Royce and Airbus used this week’s Farnborough International Airshow to warn of the dire consequences of a hard Brexit, Britain’s biggest defence firm, BAE Systems, simply shrugged its shoulders.
The business is Britain’s biggest manufacturing employer, with 34,000 staff and sales of nearly £20bn last year. But Brexit? “It’s just not that big a deal [for us],” reckons the firm that makes everything from ammunition to combat aircraft and submarines.
Its statement is wildly at odds with other major firms operating in the industrial world. The European plane maker Airbus is already stockpiling parts in preparation for a no-deal Brexit, and the aircraft engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce admitted this week that it is making plans to do the same.
Jaguar Land Rover, Britain’s biggest car manufacturer, has warned that £80bn of planned UK investment over the next five years would be at risk if Britain struck a bad Brexit deal. Meanwhile the wider UK car industry has been sounding the alarm on Brexit since well before the referendum.
Not so at BAE, which says frictionless trade once the UK has left the EU would be a good thing but has otherwise kept fairly quiet despite its dominant position.
For more read the full of article at The Guardian
