Tory lies: car industry issues were due to Brexit, not the war in Ukraine
Take a look at this video clip of Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch saying concerns faced by car makers were due to the war in Ukraine, not Brexit – coupled with a more recent news report saying the exact opposite:
Left: May 2023: Kemi Badenoch says automotive industry issues are due to the pandemic and war in Ukraine, nothing to do with Brexit
Right: June 2023: Kemi Badenoch says "Brexit was more traumatic for the automotive sector than others." pic.twitter.com/Ao5qtzqZsP
— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) June 27, 2023
The best we can say about this is that at least the lies are being debunked faster.
In fact, this one was debunked in the press as soon as it was uttered. The Guardian explained [boldings mine]:
She said:
“The issue that the automotive industries are talking about is around rules of origin. This is something that the EU are also worried about because the costs of the components have risen.
“This isn’t to do with Brexit, this is to do with supply chain issues following the pandemic and the war in Russia and Ukraine.
“I actually have had meetings with my EU trade counterpart, we are discussing these things and looking at how we can review them, especially as the TCA [trade and cooperation agreement – the UK’s Brexit deal with the EU] will be coming into review soon.”
The “rules of origin” requirements raised by car manufacturers are part of the TCA, and are therefore definitely related to Brexit. But Badenoch is right in the sense that all European car manufacturers are having problems because there is not enough battery supply in Europe, making them reliant on imports from Asia.
And wrong in the sense that there is no information here that links a car battery shortage with Ukraine. Any shortages in minerals that are used in these batteries may be overcome by obtaining them elsewhere.
The question now is: did Badenoch know she was not telling the truth, or was she just another Tory parrot, squawking out the words she had been told to say?
If so, who is telling Tory ministers to utter such tripe?
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To make evs we need raw materials from Russia or from countries where they are mined by children.
As soon as the Ukraine war is over Russia will slap sanctions on Britain. The BRIC countries offer a big enough market to keep Russia happy, the Americas are self sufficient.
If Ukraine joins NATO it’s WW3. If Russia, forget Putin, if Russia is assured that Ukraine will never join NATO today, there’ll be a ceasefire tomorrow.
As a member of the Labour party I want Starmer to be a peacemaker not a war monger!
She said war in Russia. Is there something the Tories are not telling is?