‘Taking vac control’ – how many Brextremist bosses will leave before we realise we’ve been conned?
James Dyson: Legs-it rather than Brexit.
James Dyson – what a patriot he is!
The inventor of the famous Dyson vacuum cleaner was one of the most prominent UK business leaders to support Brexit in the run-up to the EU referendum in 2016.
After the result became known, he said leaving the Single Market would liberate the UK economy and allow the country to make trade deals around the world.
He said the UK should leave the EU without an interim deal and that “uncertainty is an opportunity”; and he said “we should just walk away and they will come to us”
How interesting, then, that he has decided not to be here when they do. Or should that be if they do?
Rather than stay in the UK and take advantage of all that opportunity he mentioned, Mr Dyson is moving his headquarters from Malmesbury to Singapore.
Angela Rayner articulated the feeling of many, I think, when she responded thus:
Brexiteer James Dyson accused of "staggering hypocrisy" after moving HQ to Singapore. Not so much #Brexit but legs it! 👎https://t.co/IV1r3p2Qyy
— Angela Rayner 🌹 (@AngelaRayner) January 22, 2019
The message is clear: Mr Dyson doesn’t have faith in the UK’s ability to sustain his business, post-Brexit.
His words about “opportunity” and claims that foreign investment will “come to us” seem to have been just gusts of air, which is ironic for a maker of vacuum cleaners.
The announcement has attracted a wealth of criticism from those of us who don’t have Mr Dyson’s opportunities:
Does perfectly illustrate the utter folly of Brexit that one of its principal supporters has finally realised it will be terrible for business.
— Dan Barrett (@danbarrett6) January 22, 2019
A Twitter user identifying as “Doogs” wittily suggested Mr Dyson was “taking vac control”.
Another, identifying as “Shop Steward” put our suspicions into words: “The thing is he’s a multimillionaire so he could stay here and still make a profit In fact he could stay here, improve workers pay & conditions, and still make a profit …but greed won’t allow that. No, profit must be maximised at all costs because enough is never enough.”
And the blogger Paul Bernal asked the question that formed the basis for this article’s headline:
I’m not sure how many Brexiters moving their money or businesses out of the UK it takes before the voters realise they were being conned.
— Prof Paul Bernal (@PaulbernalUK) January 22, 2019
I’m not sure either but Gavin Esler identified one almost immediately after Dyson:
And another https://t.co/hkWykLVVvN
— Gavin Esler (@gavinesler) January 22, 2019
It provoked this response:
https://twitter.com/NoMoreUnicorns1/status/1087817591052271619
I’m not sure who “the journalists of the Four Horses of the Apocalypse” may be, but they would be right to attack such people.
While P&O isn’t on record as having supported Brexit, its decision to abandon the UK is a clear signal to other businesses: Get out – if you can.
Dyson is on record, not just as a Brexiteer but as a Brextremist, and his decision reeks of the worst kind of hypocrisy.
He supported Brexit; he influenced other people to support it; and now he is abandoning us to the consequences while he scarpers, taking his business and any benefit it has for the economy with him.
Make no mistake: This man is toxic.
He has helped inflict economic ruin on the UK, both by encouraging us into Brexit and by taking his business out of the country before it happens.
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Yet another dirty unscrupulous rat deserts the sinking ship.
I heard he had a grant from the EU to relocate to Singapore. It might be true, it may not be, but, well, I saw it and now can’t find it!
Check out Mr Dysons agricultural land grabs. He and others like him are aiming to profit post Brexit buying up productive land and building US style megafarms. Even the NFU gas been doundingcalarms.
Sorry, you broke up a bit at the end, there. Do you have links for this material?
The fact that it is just the administrative head office and two senior staff that are re locating and that his enterprises in Malmsbury, Bristol and London and the two hundred million investment on his campus at the former Hullavington Airfield and no staff are losing their jobs and he already has a business presence in the far east seem to have escaped some peoples’ notice.This, to me, seems a simple business decision and was in the pipeline brexit or no brexit.
Yes, it’s a business decision to take the benefits of his business away from the UK. By moving his head office away, he stops paying taxes in the UK.
What was to stop him from doing it, before? Had he moved it to the E.U., I could see a case for hypocrisy. Also, such language as “Brextremists,” is not helpful. I thought that you were supporting the cause of bringing people together, not watering the seeds of division?
I understand that under HMRC regulations Dyson’s will still have a taxliability on profits emanating from the UK side of the business; he will of course have all the other taxes involved eg council tax as well as meeting the employer’s NI contribution for each of his employees. Alternatively he could abandon developing his business in the global market where he sees his latest ventures succeeding or he could sell up lock stock and barrel in the UK and put 4,800 staff on the unemployed market and universal credit.