Hong Kong Kowloon firm to buy 500 coaches from Wrightbus

Hong Kong Kowloon firm to buy 500 coaches from Wrightbus
By Margaret Canning PUBLISHED 30/06/2016

Ballymena's Wrightbus is celebrating after securing a multi-million pound order for 500 buses. The company, which employs 2,000 people in Co Antrim, will be supplying the vehicles to the Kowloon Motor Bus Company in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories area. There are already 500 Wright buses on the regions' roads following earlier deals.

Company chairman and co-founder William Wright revealed news of the latest multimillion-pound contract win in an exclusive interview with the Belfast Telegraph. Mr Wright, who created the company with his father Robert in 1946, said: "Hong Kong can easily buy buses from China, but they come to us (when they want) quality." While he declined to reveal the total value of the deal, he admitted that it came to "quite a bit of money".

Mr Wright said he was happy with the order and also happy with the outcome of the EU referendum. The business boss, one of the few industry leaders in Northern Ireland to publicly back a Brexit, condemned the banks' and stock markets' "hysterical" reaction to the result. "When it comes down to it, the European Union has just been about a trade deal - although some of the countries have been trying to make it another America of federal states," he insisted. Mr Wright also claimed that EU laws on cigarette packaging had directly resulted in the closure of tobacco giant JTI Gallaher's factory in Ballymena. The plant is to shut completely next year, although lay-offs have already started.

Tyre maker Michelin is also to close its local plant in 2018, with the loss of 860 jobs. "What bugs me is that 1,000 people in Ballymena have lost their jobs in tobacco manufacturing at JTI because the EU has stated you can no longer buy 10-packs of cigarettes," the Wrightbus chairman said. "That's supposedly to stop young people smoking, but I've checked out prices. A pack of 10 would have cost £3.69 and 20 would cost £6.89. I don't think anything would stop a young person who wants to smoke from paying an extra £3."

Returning to the implications of a Brexit, he maintained he was confident that the UK would be able to negotiate strong trade deals with the remaining EU member states. "German car manufacturers send 20% of their output to the UK, and others, like Renault and Peugeot are in the same situation," Mr Wright said. "Those countries will want a decent trade deal as much as the UK (will want one). It's not sensible for them to want to punish the UK."

The leading businessman also told how worries over immigration had influenced his pro-Brexit stance. "I do think immigration should be held at a reasonable level," he said, adding that he was concerned that many immigrants arrived without essential skills. However, he revealed that his company employed a number of Romanians and said: "We don't discriminate - all we look for are skilled people."

Dismissing fears that local firms would suffer in the wake of the EU results, Mr Wright insisted: "We've learned ourselves to take these things and find a way around them." He also said he was looking forward to meeting London Mayor Sadiq Khan - the successor to Leave campaigner Boris Johnson, who also bought 1,000 buses from his firm.

"I think I will have a lot in common with him," he added. "Wrightbus started with the two of us in a tin shed, so I know all about austerity - and Sadiq's parents came over from Pakistan. His father was a bus driver. They had a tough time, but they made it." The Wrightbus chairman told how his company did limited business in Europe and had sold only eight buses - to a Dutch customer - there in recent years.

He said most European bus companies were State-owned "and don't want to take chances and try anything new", but added: "We have salespeople looking at Europe regularly." Rather than focusing on the continent, the company makes many of its sales in Great Britain and the Republic, also exporting vehicles to China, Hong Kong, Singapore and India. Wrights Group is Ballymena's biggest employer and with all the closures will soon be its last significant manufacturer.

In its latest results, the company almost more than doubled pre-tax profits to £11.6m on turnover of £297m.

The fall of EUmpires some post Brexit thoughts

The most enduring and immutable lesson of history is that eventually every empire built by man falls. This was true of the The Aztecs the Roman empire the Spanish and Portugese the French the USSR and the British empire and now the EU with all its pretentions to becoming one it is likewise falling apart also.e demise of the EU is as inevitabkle as it is irrevocable.

All the artificially created financial ponsi schemes propping it up are conspiring along with the myriad of other crises it is now seething under to hasten its fall. Spain after Sundays inconclusive elections is still not able to elect an effective government. The French government facing a huge popular revolt is ripe for collapse also. The Italians are bouyed by a UK brexit also ready to quit at the drop of a hat. Britains brexit vote has simply put the spotlight on all these ptressures and as time progresses this will inevitably increase.

The fall in our currency suddenly makes our manufactured and farming goods more attractive on a world market even to the EU. The Germans industrialists are already pressurising Merkel not to do anything in a fit of pique that would jeapordise their car sales etc as we could quickly get a taste for Korean Japeneses and if Mr Trump wins US made cars as alternatives.

The unfolding situation in the Labour party where a Blarite buracracy which he imposed on the party obliterated any dissent from central party policy on the EU and everything else in a weird pretence it didnt exsist is now mirroring the antidemocratic EU system on which it was based. Two pro EU factions are fighting and tearing each other apart for ultimate control of a party which has totally lost touch with its core voters. Their utter condescending contempt for their former core support base is so breathtaking it defies description all due to the Blairist purges of the very people who made brexit a reality. The only ones who stuck with those people and should be rewarded for it with high office are Kate Hoey and Gisela Stuart ironically herself a German.

The venality and cheap opportunism displayed by the Lib Dems is also breath taking. They now claim voting for them they will call another referendum to rejoin the EU. This the party of tuition fees plus a party with just 7% of the vote at the last election. That means they were rejected by 93% of voters.

Also the total arrogance of the Boris Johnston Vote Leavers. The people voted for brexit not Boris Johnston or Michael Gove. The people who swung it wouldnt vote for either even under torcher. They therefore have no right whatever to dictate who will negotiate brexit. The voting figures for who the people supporting brexit and who they actually support at elections dictate that has to be now fully and fairly reflected in who does the negotiating.

TODAY IS OUR INDEPENDENCE DAY

The fight was a truly epic and bruising one and the peoples voice has prevailed. We now stand on the brink of a whole new future as a proud independent nation.

As even Mr Cameron admitted shortly before caliing this vote we live in a great country and the British people will do magnificently in or out of the EU.

Whatever this future brings let us all unite to make that reality. To ALL the people who voted thanks indeed to all who voted remain we now have 94% of the rest of the planet to go out there and as a single country with out own interests fully at heart to make those trading deals as we have done for thousands of years that means we all benefit and prosper.

Noone who voted for brexit did so with anthing less in mind nor we believe did anyone who voted remain. Its our duty now together to make it so on this the UKs INDEPENDENCE DAY.
Heartfelt and emotional Thanks and eternal gratitude to one and all.

This day should now become an annual national celebration as the UKs independence day

 UNITED WE STAND DIVIDED WE FALL

LEXIT The Left Wing movie on quitting the EU

The Left Wing case to leave the EU

US shootings since Florida massacre - 158 killed & 374 wounded

If I was to say that following on from the Florida massacre at the Pulse nightclub another club had been attacked and 158 killed with 374 wounded the media frenzy would be poring over the details for weeks. 

While the incidend I describe is fictional sadly the figures for the dead and wounded are hard cold fact. In the week following Omar Mateens massacre of 55 people in the Pulse nightclub up to the Sunday 19th of June there have according to the Gun Violence Archive, a charity tracking America’s gun violence occoured, shootings of 158 killed and 374 wounded by gun crimes.

Thankfully such a dire situation is not one we experience in this country where gun killings

because such weapon holding is the exception are a comparitive rarity. In the light of recent tragic events we will have to redouble our efforts to make it even harder for those who resort to vilolence to get hold of these weapons in the first place.

Gun Violence Archive 

Economist who once advised European Commission switches allegiance from Remain to Leave

A LEADING economist who was a senior advisor to the European Commission, has switched from the Remain camp to Leave over his fears of the economic consequences of staying in the EU.
Leading remain economist changes sides to support brexit
By DAVID MADDOX, EXCLUSIVE
04:16, Thu, Jun 16, 2016 | UPDATED: 08:10, Thu, Jun 16, 2016

Professor Brian Sturgess, the Managing Editor of World Economics has also expressed his “disgust” over the Project Fear campaign waged by Downing Street and the Remain campaign to persuade voters not to back Leave. In a damning analysis, Professor Sturgess has warned that his monthly analysis of currencies has highlighted that the eurozone is on the point of collapse.

 the strains within the single currency area as “crippling” and points out that while the euro is undervalued in Germany by eight per cent it is overvalued in France by an enormous 13 per cent. This means Germany has a massive cash surplus while France cannot pay its debts.

He said: “There is no doubt that the eurozone will break up and it will be better for Britain if it is not part of the EU when that happens because we will end up having to pay to support other members when it happens.”

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He said he changed from Remain to Leave about a month ago partly out of shock over the tactics used by the Treasury and Downing Street. He said: “I switched to Leave around a month ago, I was always eurosceptic but I was disgusted at by the hysteria coming from Remain.

David Cameron has been accused of scaremongering

“The dangers have been completely over exaggerated. For example the worst that could happen to manufacturing is a three per cent tariff, that’s not going to make companies like Nissan move [from the UK], it isn’t going to make a difference.” He added: “I think it’s shocking for a Prime Minister and Chancellor to talk down their country and that has in itself had an effect on the economy.”

Sturgess: "I think it’s shocking for a Prime Minister and Chancellor to talk down their country" He also said that scaremongering over the pound falling with a Brexit was wrong. He pointed out that the pound is currently five per cent overvalued on the money markets which “means it will have to come down anyway whatever the [referendum] result.”

David Cameron and the Remain campaign have been nicknamed 'Project Fear.'  I don’t buy the argument that we will be punished for leaving at all. Professor Brian Sturgess He added: “I don’t buy the argument that we will be punished for leaving at all.”

He pointed out that Remain’s argument over the single market covering 508 million people ignored the fact that 62 million of those people are citizens of the UK, the world’s fifth biggest economy.

He went on: “Also if we stay in there is no chance of reforming the EU. If we leave it will force the other countries to look again and make changes.

Aboriginies ethnically cleansed to facilitate Chinese mining firm in TTIP like deal

Australia Services Union poster

In Australia, after ChAFTA  (China-Australia Free Trade Agreement a TTIP style deal) government fiscal policy is now being dictated by the necessity to serve these ruinous trade agreements. After ChAFTA, the Abbott Liberal Government there forced the West Australian administration to evict thousands of Aboriginal families from their ancestral home lands, which had been granted to them by treaty. They forcibly took them away in trucks and bulldozed their houses.

This was done so that their land could be used for mining exploration by Chinese interests - ChAFTA deal is mainly concerned with bauxite, iron ore and coal exports to China, a continual supply of which is necessary to support their voracious industrial expansion. Of course, there was vehement protest against this but it was barely reported around the world.

A Chinese company called Landbridge (a shopfront of the Chinese Foreign Ministry) also leased the port of Darwin for 99 years under ChAFTA, so they can now fully control shipping in and out of it for the next century.

Forced evictions to facilitate Chinese mining companies

There was widespread public protests, but any attempt by the Australian Government to block the move could've been construed as "restraint of trade" as this deal like the secret TTIP one for the EU - USA includes an equally contraversial Investor State Dispute Settlement mechanism that leads to imposition of huge fines for interfering with Landbridges ability to make a profit. These are the sorts of corollaries you can expect from these toxic trade deals.

The Australian Liberals have just signed a rival TPP; (Trans Pacific Partnership) with the US Obama administration  and other Pacific rim nations. Because of these deals Australia is now largely owned and operated by big business, especially the giant mining corporations which dominate the economy. It was their proposed introduction of a mining tax which brought down the Rudd Labour Government. Don't allow the UK to go down a similar path.

VOTE LEAVE TAKE BACK CONTROL

Flights to aid Vote Leave Fight

Take Control Tour

To help raise awareness, Britten-Norman Aviation is launching its "Take Control Tour".
Between 8 and 23 June the Company will be flying around Great Britain in one of its world famous turboprop Islander aircraft. 

The Islander, painted gold with a Union Flag on its tail, will be towing a banner with a message to support Vote Leave.Please follow the Islander on its tour by posting your best photos of the aircraft on social media: @BrittenNorman

Please remember to include #VoteLeave in your entries.

At the end of the tour Britten-Norman will review the pictures and will select a winning entry. The winner will be invited for a facility tour and an opportunity to Take Control of an Islander during a private flight.

Flypasts will take place as follows:

Thursday    16 th June    Edinburgh & Glasgow   Friday         17 th June    Manchester, Liverpool & Blackpool   Saturday    18 th June   Birmingham, Leicester & Nottingham   Sunday        19 th June   London   Monday      20 th June   Westminster, London + Veteran's Day   Tuesday       21 st June   TBC   Wednesday 22 nd June  TBC   Thursday    23 rd June   Election Day Britten Norman Fly past Updates CLICK FOR LATEST INFO

1.8 million Turkish migrants a DROP IN THE OCEAN reveal diplomats

1.8 million Turkish migrants a DROP IN THE OCEAN reveal diplomats

The Sunday Times has a great scoop: leaked cables reveal UK diplomats have discussed visa liberalisation for Turks coming to Britain, despite David Cameron’s pledge that “we won’t be offering visa-free access to Turks”. And there’s more…
Guido has been passed the cache of diplomatic cables. The telegram below is marked “Official – sensitive” and was sent by British diplomats in Kosovo to the Foreign Office. It reveals the European Commission plotted to “slipstream” visa liberalisation for Kosovo “behind Turkey”, because “1.8 million Kosovars” are “a drop in that larger ocean” by comparison. A stunning admission of the huge scale of potential new immigration – and collusion to play down the impact…

The cable also admits the obvious, that “some will… abuse the system”. Privately British diplomats are talking about 1.8 million Kosovars as a “drop in the ocean” compared to potential Turkish immigration. Yet they are planning visa-free access for Turks – and Dave wants you to believe this isn’t an issue in the referendum…

The EU Asset Stripping of the UK

In the six years prior to the UK joining the EU back in 1973 this country ran a trading surplus with Europe. In the 40 years since we joined we have ran a trading deficit with them. If the remain camps case held any water we should by  now have massively increased that prior trade surplus. The exact complete opposite has been the case this last 40 years they run a surplus trading with us instead and here is one of the main reasons why.

When we hear how the EU is good for British industry... we quote the farmers and the fishing industry as examples. But if you want to see how the EU has de-assembled our industries spare 5 minutes to read the following... The EU have conspired to come and asset strip and weaken the UK.. Heres a sample of how this is still happening. READ ON:

British Army's new Ajax fighting vehicles to be built in SPAIN using SWEDISH steel at the request of the EU to support jobs in Spain with EU grant, rather than Wales.

Cadbury moved factory to Poland 2011 with EU grant.

Crown Closures, Bournemouth (Was METAL BOX), gone to Poland with EU grant, once employed 1,200.

Dyson gone to Malaysia, with an EU loan.

Ford Transit moved to Turkey 2013 with EU grant.

Gallaghers Tobacco Ballymena  JTI Gallaher a challenging regulatory and operating environment and that it had "fought very hard" against plain packaging and smaller pack ban proposals in the UK. Production moved to Germany

Gillette gone to eastern Europe with EU grant.

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station to be built by French company EDF, part owned by the French government, using cheap Chinese steel that has catastrophically failed in other nuclear installations. Now EDF say the costs will be double or more and it will be very late even if it does come online.

Hoover Merthyr factory moved out of UK to Czech Republic and the Far East by Italian company Candy with EU backing.

Hornby models gone. In fact all toys and models now gone from UK along with the patents all with with EU grants.

ICI integration into Holland’s AkzoNobel with EU bank loan and within days of the merger, several factories in the UK, were closed, eliminating 3,500 jobs
Boots sold to Italians Stefano Pessina who have based their HQ in Switzerland to avoid tax to the tune of £80 million a year, using an EU loan for the purchase.

Indesit at Bodelwyddan Wales gone with EU grant.

Jaguar Land Rover new plant in Slovakia with EU grant, owned by Tata, the same company who have trashed our steel works and emptied the workers pension funds.

JDS Uniphase run by two Dutch men, bought up companies in the UK with £20 million in EU 'regeneration' grants, created a pollution nightmare and just closed it all down leaving 1,200 out of work and an environmental clean-up paid for by the UK tax-payer. They also raided the pension fund and drained it dry.

London buses are mostly run by Spanish and German companies.

M&S manufacturing gone to far east with EU loan

Mini cars are built by BMW mostly in Holland and Austria that Cameron stood in front of as an example of British engineering . His campaign bus was made in Germany even though we have Plaxton, Optare, Bluebird, Dennis etc., in the UK. The bicycle for the Greens was made in the far east, not by Raleigh UK but then they are probably going to move to the Netherlands too as they have said recently

Michelin Ballymena tyre factory due to the "significant downturn" in demand for truck tyres in Europe since the financial crisis of 2007

Peugeot closed its Ryton plant (was Rootes Group) and moved production to Slovakia with EU grant.

Sekisui Alveo said production at its Merthyr Tydfil Industrial Park foam plant will relocate production to Roermond in the Netherlands, with EU funding.

Scottish Power is owned by a Spanish company.

Swindon  rail locomotives and rolling stock. Not any more, it's Bombardier in Derby and due to their losses in the aviation market, that could see the end of the British railways manufacturing altogether even though Bombardier had EU grants to keep Derby going which they diverted to their loss-making aviation side in Canada.

Texas Instruments Greenock gone to Germany with EU grant.

UK airports are owned by a Spanish company.

39% of British invention patents have been passed to foreign companies, many of them in the EU

Anyone who thinks the EU is good for British industry or any other business simply hasn't paid attention to what has been systematically asset-stripped from the UK. Name me one major technology company still running in the UK, I used to contract out to many, then the work just dried up as they were sold off to companies from France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, etc., and now we don't even teach electronic technology for technicians any more, due to EU regulations.

I haven't detailed our non-existent fishing industry the EU paid to destroy, nor the farmers being paid NOT to produce food they could sell for more than they get paid to do nothing, don't even go there.

I haven't mentioned what it costs us to be asset-stripped like this, nor have I mentioned immigration, nor the risk to our security if control of our armed forces is passed to Brussels or Germany.

Find something that's gone the other way, I've looked and I just can't. If you think the EU is a good idea,

1/ You haven't read the party manifesto of The European Peoples' Party.
2/ You haven't had to deal with EU petty bureaucracy tearing your business down.
3/ You havnt head how TTIP will allow US boardrooms to write EU laws

The Referendum Game Song

The Referendum Game was produced by Trevor Horn and ex 10 CC star Lol Creme helped write the music. Vocals are by Art Wellesley.  The four-minute track also lists great British inventions like the steam engine, the lightbulb, the telephone and the world wide web. In one amusing reference to the Remain camp's Project Fear the song highlights some of the ridiculous claims made by the Remain side and memorably warns: "They try to scare us, Tony Blair us". The single was released as bookmakers slashed the odds on a Brexit vote after a new surge in bets on the referendum outcome.

DOWNLOAD YOUR OWN COPY HERE!
The Referendum Game Song MP3 

Vladimir Bukovsky ex Gulag prisoner compares EU to the old Soviet system (uncanny resemblance)

It is really puzzling to me that just having buried one monster the Soviet Union, another remarkably similar one, the European Union, is being built. 

 Exactly what is the European Union? 

Perhaps by examining the Soviet version we can get the answer. The Soviet Union was governed by 15 unelected people who appointed each other, who met in secret, and who were not accountable to anyone. The European Union is governed by two dozen people who appoint each other, meet in secret and whom we cannot sack. One might say that the European Union has an elected parliament, well the Soviet Union had a parliament of a sort too, the Supreme Soviet that just rubber stamped the Polit Bureau decisions pretty much like the European Parliament does where speaking time in the chamber is limited within each group and often amounts to one minute per speaker. 

In the EU there are hundreds of thousands of Eurocrats with their huge salaries, staffs, servants, bonuses, privledges, their lifelong immunity from prosecution, which is simply shuffled from one position to another, no matter what they do or fail to do. Is this not exactly like the Soviet regime? The Soviet Union was created by coersion and very often by a military occupation. The European Union is being created admittedly not by arrmed force, but by coersion and economic bullying.

In order to continue to exsist the Soviet Union spread itself further and further. The moment it stopped spreading it started collapsing and I suspect the same is true of the European Union. We were told the purpose of the Soviet Union was to create a new historic entity, the 'Soviet people' and that we must forget our nationalities our ethnic traditions and customs. The same seems to be true of the European Union. They dont want you to be British or French. They want you all to be a new historic entity, European. To supress all your national feelings and live as multinational community European. 

After 73 years the same system in the Soviet Union resulted in more ethnic conflict than anywhere in the world. In the Soviet Union one of the grand purposes was the destruction of the nation state, and that's exactly what we observe in the European Union today. Brussels intends to userp nation states so that they cease to exsist. 

Corruption was built into the Soviet system, from top down and so it is in the EU. The same endemic corruption activity that we saw in the old soviet union has flourished in the EU. Those who oppose or expose it are silenced or punished - nothing changes. In the Soviet Union we had the gulag, I think we have a gulag in the EU also, an intellectual gulag known as political correctness. When anyone tries to speak their mind on questions of race or gender or if their views differ from those approved, they will be ostracised. This is the beginning of the gulag, the beginning of your loss of freedom. 

In the Soviet Union they told us they needed a federal state to avoid war, in the European Union they are telling you the same thing. In short the same ideaology underpins both systems. The EU is the old soviet model presented in western guise. 

But again like the Soviet Union the European Union has within itself the seeds of its own demise. Unfortunately when it collapses and it will, it will leave immense destruction behind, and we will be left with huge economic and ethnic problems. The old Soviet system was incapable of reform, so is the European Union, but there is an alternative to being ruled by those two dozen self appointed officials in Brussels. It is called independence. You dont have to accept what they have planned for you. After all you have never been asked if you wanted to join. I have lived in your future and it didnt work!

Vladimir Bukovsky