Hi, Windrush ,spot on we ran many B M C , 702 done us proud ,90 to 150 thousand miles , then throw a big end threw the side ,but as many others were over loaded ,10 ton on there backs floged up and down the motor ways ,but throw a gold seal recon in 350 quid back on the road ,but them FJ TILT cabs we had 6 of them nearly broke us , Cheers Barry
b.waddy:
Hi, Windrush ,spot on we ran many B M C , 702 done us proud ,90 to 150 thousand miles , then throw a big end threw the side ,but as many others were over loaded ,10 ton on there backs floged up and down the motor ways ,but throw a gold seal recon in 350 quid back on the road ,but them FJ TILT cabs we had 6 of them nearly broke us , Cheers Barry
Well I had a lot of Leylands, Ridgids, Tippers ,Artic Units, & They gave my family run firm a good living with very few problems, Regards Larry.
Why did Leyland fail?
There are others better qualified than I to speculate as to the reasons but I served 29 years with Leyland and I saw it thrive, then decline and finally collapse in 1993. Many of the reasons have been identified previously by others but I will present my choice of reasons based on actual observations and feelings at the time. There are many reasons, including missed opportunities, and they vary greatly in terms of short-term and long-term impact. With two particular exceptions, the company could probably have survived the all other problems it faced.
To set the scene, in the early sixties, Leyland Motors was the largest truck & bus manufacturer in the UK and the UK was the largest truck market in Europe. But the truck market always cyclical in nature and whenever the UK economy caught a cold, the truck industry would catch a bad dose of ‘flu.
Leyland exported around 60% of production, was highly profitable, and respected as a supplier of quality commercial vehicles. Despite that, it was a relatively small industrial organisation in comparison with the UK car industry and was seen as being paternalistic, parochial, parsimonious and occasionally uncompromising.
As this is a truck forum and my background is in trucks, I will mostly limit my comments to the commercial vehicle side rather than cars.
Here is my list of what I consider to be a fair selection of the most critical reasons, in rough chronological order.
1. Leadership and succession.
In 1963 Sir Henry Spurrier, grandson of the founder, retired and selected Donald Stokes the sales director as the new managing director of Leyland Motors. This was a surprise to many as the main contender was perceived to be Stanley Markland who was the then MD of both Albion Motors and Standard Triumph. Both Stokes and Markland had started out as Leyland student apprentices and having progressed to director level, they emerged as arch-rivals for the top post.
Stokes was an absolutely brilliant sales executive. He was articulate, engaging, enthusiastic, technically competent, unassuming and unpretentious - all this with a broad smile. He had vision and was solely responsible for charting Leyland’s drive into overseas markets immediately after WW2. Export sales prospered hugely under his management for 20 years. Stokes was ambitious and always had an appetite for new challenges and conquests.
In contrast, Markland was the consummate business manager. Whilst he could be a bit abrasive, he had an acute business sense and was widely respected right down to shop floor level where he was seen as firm and decisive. He was the man sent by Spurrier to turn round Standard Triumph after its take over in 1961. He did so in exemplary fashion - slashing costs and excess management whilst promoting young talent and returning it to profitability. He was then appointed to MD of ACV where he brought about the extensive development of the AEC truck range and introduced the new AV505 and AV760 engines.
Having been passed over for the top job, it would be no surprise that Markland resigned within a year. Markland’s departure was a massive loss as he was a highly competent engineer and business manager. This led, in my opinion, to undermining both the engineering and business integrity of the company. Markland would have avoided many, if not all, of the major pitfalls that were to be encountered later.
Leyland was then in a “golden period” with full order books, decent products, factories working overtime, huge export orders, continuous product innovation and public acclaim.
Perversely, this aura of success would bring about political interference which ultimately would be fatal – hence reason No3.
To be continued shortly……
2. The Ergomatic cab
Introduced in 1964, the Ergomatic cab was the first major investment in rationalisation since the merger with AEC in 1962. The cab was to become standard across the Leyland, Albion and AEC ranges. It was revolutionary in that it tilted to give direct access to the engine. It also gave lower noise levels, better visibility and driver comfort. It was received with great acclaim.
However it precipitated a new set of problems. It was a one size-fits-all and it was a low set cab designed to allow easy access. This was fine for the smaller trucks but with bigger engines it resulted in overheating due to restricted airflow resulting in problems such as blown gaskets. The low cab also meant that the fan was relocated on to the crankshaft, the radiator was reduced in size and the top of the radiator was below the cylinder heads. Engines were fitted with a plastic fan which was prone to disintegrating resulting in radiator damage. The inevitable outcome was increased warranty costs and the first significant loss of confidence in Leyland on the part of hauliers.
In addition it was unsuitable for most overseas markets. The engine cover inside the cabin was extra large and biased to one side so that in LHD form it made the driver’s position very cramped. In developing markets, the low cab gave a poor angle of approach with resultant damage to the radiator and fan. The large windscreen caused the temperature in the cab to increase in bright sunshine and it was expensive to replace. The plastic instrument binnacle was also inclined to vibrate and disintegrate in the tropics. On top of all that, the cab was prone to rust – just like all the UK cars in the 1960’s.
Solutions to all these problems (except the LHD issue) were eventually achieved including the introduction of the high datum cab but it all took time and money whilst undermining brand loyalty. The missed opportunity here was not doing a crash program to introduce a high datum cab immediately the problems were identified. But it took until 1971 before this modified cab was launched. One could say Leyland were too proud to admit they got it seriously wrong but it could be due to being locked into the contract for 30,000 cabs with Sankeys.
To be continued shortly………
3. Labour Government pressure
Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson came to power in 1964 and formed the Industrial Reorganisation Committee (IRC) - designed to encourage mergers to make industry more efficient i.e. simplistic theory that dictates that “bigger is better” as espoused by Anthony Wedgewood–Benn then minster for industry. The IRC looked at the motor industry and saw that BMC was in a poor way - loosing market share steadily to Ford and other manufacturers. In 1967 it achieved sales of £467 million, and yet lost £3 million. It suffered from poor management, lack of competitive products in key sectors and dreadful industrial relations.
In mid 1967 the IRC suggested a merger of BMC with Leyland so as to capitalise on the latter’s success.
To progress this idea, in October 1967 Harold Wilson invited Sir George Harriman of BMC and Sir Donald Stokes to a meeting at Chequers where he said that a merger would be “in the national interest”. What Wilson served up however, was a poisoned chalice.
Interestingly, history was to repeat itself when in 2008 Gordon Brown, another Labour PM persuaded Victor Blank of Lloyds to merge with H.B.O.S. Lloyds was highly successful whilst HBOS was a basket case on the eve of the financial crash of 2008.
In the rush to get the deal consummated, there was little time to carry out due diligence and in January 1968 the merger was announced. It was to be a monumental political and industrial blunder.
Within 2 weeks Leyland learned that BMC had 60,000 vehicles parked up due to component shortages and that a recent forecast profit at BMC would turn out to be a loss. This cast the merger into doubt with some Leyland directors regretting the decision to merge. A press release calling off the merger was even drafted in readiness. Fellow Leyland directors Jim Slater and John Barber told Stokes that serious rationalisation at BMC would be essential if the merged company was ever to be viable. None-the-less the merger went ahead, sweetened by a £25M loan from the IRC and the concession that Leyland directors would be in the majority on the board. The missed opportunity here was not backing out at this stage.
The merger produced the fifth largest vehicle manufacturer in the world and it accounted for over half the entire output of the British motor industry but fundamentally the deal lacked commercial logic. BMC was a classic Augean stable. It needed a massive clean out. BMC had no decent products in the pipeline to compete with Ford’s Cortina. It had no product that suited the fleet market. It was loosing market share steadily, loosing money, suffered from incompetent management and was plagued with a militant workforce.
The merged company comprised 100 separate businesses with 200,000 employees and as such was an unwieldy conglomerate which could never succeed. With the merger in place, the prospect off serious rationalisation faded with Stokes citing union opposition. Stokes had the vision but not the ruthlessness. In reality, to make it work was an impossible task for anyone. Should he have sad “No” to the Prime Minister?
It was a case of a prize salmon swallowing the carcase of a dying shark. The difference in size and complexities between the two companies was enormous. The Leyland Group employed 34,000 compared to 160,000 in cars. Turnover was approximately £40M for trucks and £460M for cars. Leyland shares on the stock market were priced around 10 times those of BMC giving Leyland a higher total market value. The market is rarely wrong so this is another indicator of the serious trouble BMC was in.
The result would be that Leyland’s management time and precious financial resources would be diverted into salvaging BMC.
It was a merger that should never have happened. BMC should have been left to go bankrupt and had it done so, the viable parts could have been picked up and used by other manufacturers. The unproductive and militant workforce would have learned a valuable lesson and the entire the UK’s manufacturing industry might have been spared much of the industrial strife of the late 60’s and 70’s.
In gratitude Harold Wilson made Stokes a life peer one year after the merger.
The car division became an ever deeper money pit which siphoned off resources that would otherwise have gone into product development in the truck and bus ranges. The die was cast.
To be continued……
4. The Boffin and his 3 failed engine projects
In 1964 Stokes recruited Dr Albert Fogg to be director of research. Previously head of M.I.R.A, he had an impressive CV and was seen as an engineer who would think “outside the box”. In the words of the chairman he was to “bridge the gap between the rapid advance in scientific knowledge and the practical application of that knowledge by the industrial engineer”. It was a powerful new position. He rightly acknowledged the trend towards more powerful truck engines – prompted in part by changes to gross vehicle weights in the UK and Europe but it was his radical “blue-sky” approach that contributed significantly to Leyland’s demise.
Rather than progressive development of existing engines with turbo-charging, Fogg advocated development of a revolutionary pair of diesel engines to be known as the O.500 and O.700. They shared the distinction of eliminating cylinder head gaskets by having a combined cylinder block and head castings. The design also featured an overhead cam. Blowing gaskets had not been a big issue previously but was envisaged as a potential problem if turbo-charging was to deliver sufficiently higher cylinder pressures.
The O.700 plans were quickly dropped when the first prototype showed that the overall height of the engine was too great to be fitted under the new Ergomatic cab. Rapid development of the O.500 continued and a completely new production facility was commissioned ready for its production at a cost of around £100m. Manufacturing output from the new automated machine tools was plagued with technical issues giving rise to 35% failure rate on the production line alone. In service the engine suffered major structural failures and to compound matters it was time-consuming to repair and maintain. Production had to be discontinued.
This drove Fogg to look around for an expedient but instead of fitting turbos an existing and proven engine, he resurrected an earlier still-born project for a compact V8 designed at AEC. Whilst the V8 had been shelved in the face of problems during development, AEC had already purchased the machine tools for its production. This gives a clue as to how bad it really was.
This V8 was an over square design and, as such, characteristically needed to be run at relatively higher speeds to achieve a given horsepower. Whilst it was lightweight, like all over-square V8’s it had high fuel consumption, noise and emission levels despite comments to the contrary in the relevant press release.
At its release in 1966, Mr. D. K. Roberts, chief engineer and a director of AEC extolled the virtues of the V8 saying ”the strict enforcement of weight regulations would favour a lightweight engine, one having a good low speed torque output that could give an acceptable performance when mated to a five or six-ratio gearbox.””
In reality, an over square engine has poor low speed torque and performs best only when coupled to a gearbox with between 9 and 15 ratios.
He went on to say that a competitor’s patents “had covered the best cylinder bore to stroke ratios so the choice was either a long stroke “V” engine or a squat over-square “V” engine”
In reality no manufacturer can patent dimensions or ratios so this is a limp excuse for the choice of an over-square design. Over-square designs have predominately been failures. Just ask ■■■■■■■■ Roberts failed to say why they did not choose a long stroke which would have given better torque and lower revs. Trucking history is littered with failed over-squares whereas the most successful V engines have all been under-square e.g. Mercedes Benz Scania.
In service the V8 was a design disaster. One even failed catastrophically on an early Commercial Motor magazine road test! Amongst an extensive list of defects it had a tendency to pull the cylinder liners down into the sump which brought about complete self-destruction. For the better ones which did not self-destroy, the big-end bearings were doomed to failure around 50,000 miles. The result was increased warranty costs and further erosion of customer confidence. It also compelled Leyland and AEC to go to the likes of ■■■■■■■■ Rolls Royce, Gardner and DAF for high horsepower engines and drove truckers to imported marques.
Engine calamity number three was the gas turbine design with links to the days of Sir Frank Whittle acquired from Rover after the take over by Leyland in 1967. Dr Fogg espoused his vision of installing it in some heavy truck models. Whilst it never went into series production it did consume considerable development and financial resources over a number of years.
The failure of these three engine projects meant that 7 years were lost until a turbo version of the AV760 came out in 1974 as the TL12 in the Marathon. By then even that was underpowered against the latest competitors. Furthermore the economies of scale to be achieved through rationalisation were never realised.
The saddest part is the missed opportunity of developing the venerable Leyland O.680 engine. The design was licensed to DAF who bored it out by a modest 3mm, turbocharged it and tidied up a few minor items. The result is a major success that is still in available today turning out more than twice the original horsepower. Had Leyland achieved the same, it would have reaped massive economies of scale by standardising this engine across the Leyland, AEC, Scammel, Guy, Daimler heavy truck and bus model ranges.
5. Another failed engine
This time it wasn’t originally a Leyland Group product as it was one inherited from BMC’s Bathgate factory. Bathgate was opened in 1962 and started producing the FJ with a tilted under-floor 5.1L and 5.7L engines.
The under-floor design gave rise to major overheating problems. Added to this were the structural problems with the engine arising from manufacturing issues associated with producing a new engine in a green field factory using semi-skilled labour. Not too dissimilar to the Leyland O.500?
Prior to this, BMC had a good share of the UK light to medium truck sector and very substantial volumes of exports to developing markets around the world. They sold thousands of the bonneted WF model to West Africa. BMC never fixed the engine and after the merger in 1968 Leyland was pre-occupied with problems closer to home, so it took from 1968 to 1972 to rectify the problems with the introduction of the new 98 series.
The result was the permanent loss of a huge volume of truck sales in BMC’s traditional truck markets.
6. Scandinavian Imports
Prior to joining the EEC, the UK was a member of EFTA together with Ireland, Sweden, Norway, Portugal and Switzerland. Imports and exports between member counties were duty-free.
This opened the door for imports of Scania and Volvo trucks at a time when Leyland could not supply the market with sufficient volume. This period of short supply overlapped with the serious engine problems mentioned earlier. This also coincided with changes in UK C&U regulations allowing higher gross weights.
The Scandinavian products were cheaper but at the same time excellent quality, had more horsepower and were a driver’s delight. They quickly entrenched themselves in the UK market, helped no end by an extended strike by the Leyland trucks workforce in 1973. This was the first strike at Leyland since 1957 and was a result of union militancy coming up the M6 from the Midlands based car operations. The shortage of production at Leyland continued through until the deep recession in the early 80’s.
Previously loyal Leyland, AEC and Guy fleets switched over to the Scania and Volvo. They knew also that if they sent any of these trucks on a continental run they would return more reliably because firstly, it was a better product and secondly the Swedes had a support network throughout Europe.
I think Stokes never saw the Scandinavian threat for what it was as he was predominantly an export man who was fighting against Mercedes in all Leyland’s overseas markets. He lectured us trainees on the necessity of focussing our hatred towards Mercedes Benz. Meanwhile Scania and Volvo were coming in through the back door.
6. Metrication & Exports
The UK government was slow to issue legislation for metrication of weights & measures in readiness for the UK joining the EEC and it did not compel manufacturers to adopt metrication prior to 1975. Leyland saw the need for metrication early on and The O.500 engine in 1969 was the first major item at Leyland to be designed to metric standards but that engine turned out to be a failure. Other major components were still Imperial.
In 1968, Leyland embarked on setting up a European dealer network to distribute vehicles from the AEC and Leyland factories but soon learned that no one was interested in buying a vehicle that had a mix of UNF, Whitworth and other threads. The European customers understandably demanded metric and nothing other than metric.
The cost and logistics of changing existing products to metric standards would be enormous in terms of engineering effort and cost. All existing engines, gearboxes, axles etc would have to be converted together with the machine tools used to manufacture all the components going into these assemblies.
It was beyond Leyland’s resources to meet this cost whilst supporting the loss making car division.
7. Labour Government No2 commissions the Ryder Report.
Despite all these problems, Leyland trucks continued to be profitable through 1975 but the bulk of this was steadily siphoned off to prop up the car division. This lack of investment in trucks meant that problems could not be rectified promptly and the economies of scale were never achieved from rationalising the truck product ranges – particularly the engines and gearboxes used in them.
Even with the benefit of Leyland Trucks (diminishing) profits, the car division was in a real bad way and so in 1974, the Labour government initiated an enquiry into all of BLMC which emerged in due course as the Ryder Report.
Unbelievably, the Ryder envisaged no redundancies and no factory closures. It brought about partial (65%) nationalisation. Ryder recommended capital expenditure of £1,264 million from the government, backed up with a working capital of £260 million. Ryder went on to say ““If this was not taken it would be seen that the government had allowed the UK’s leading car company to collapse and fail – a result that could have led to around one million people being put out of work.”” Even if it was only half a million redundancies it would have been too much for any Labour government to swallow so more money was thrown into the bottomless pit that was Leyland Cars. The Ryder Report said exactly what the government wanted it to say.
Here we have a crucial missed opportunity.
With government money guaranteed to continue flowing into the cars division, the militant labour force knew they had a guaranteed gravy train so strikes and walk outs in Leyland Cars grew more frequent. Wage demands grew and restrictive work practices perpetuated. Quality was abysmal. Meanwhile market share continued to be lost.
Ryder should have recommended splitting the car division away from Leyland truck and buses. Leyland then would have been freed to progress unhindered whether independently or in association with another truck manufacturer. Because it was still profitable, private finance would have become available. It would be another 12 years before Leyland was split off and privatised via a merger with DAF.
Towards the end.
Post Ryder, BLMC would go on to cost the new Thatcher government another £1,000M in cash but under the tenure of M.D. Michael Edwardes and at Thatcher’s insistence, the process of stopping the rot and clearing out the mess was begun.
Within 2 months of Thatcher assuming office, the Communist works convener “Red Robbo” was drummed out of Longbridge. Edwardes’ next big step was closing the Triumph Speke factory and he then went on to close 14 more plants whilst reducing the labour force from 196,000 to 104,000. The process of cleaning up continued and the BLMC colossus was progressively split up in readiness for privatisation.
As part of this process, in 1980 Leyland was given a modest £30 to build a brand new assembly plant (LAP) in Lancashire with enough capacity to replace the antiquated facilities at Scammel, AEC, Albion, Guy, Bathgate and Leyland itself.
With government money guaranteed to continue flowing into the cars division, the militant labour force knew they had a guaranteed gravy train so strikes and walk outs in Leyland Cars grew more frequent. Wage demands grew and restrictive work practices perpetuated. Quality was abysmal. Meanwhile market share continued to be lost.
Ryder should have recommended splitting the car division away from Leyland truck and buses. Leyland then would have been freed to progress unhindered whether independently or in association with another truck manufacturer. Because it was still profitable, private finance would have become available. It would be another 12 years before Leyland was split off and privatised via a merger with DAF.
[/quote]
Leyland Trucks today.
Leyland Trucks has been a subsidiary of Paccar (Kenworth & Peterbuilt) of the USA since 1998. It is the centre for design, development and manufacture of DAF’s range of light and medium trucks for the entire European market. It operates from the LAP where it was recently announced that the 400,00th truck rolled off the assembly line. In 2014 it produced 12,506 trucks.
I find it very comforting that the village of Leyland has still got “ T’ Motors” s as they call it and that the business is thriving once again.
The older buildings at South Works, North Works have long since been demolished and are now housing estates. The Farringdon and Spurrier Works have been converted into a business park.
The Albion facility is now a key subsidiary of American Axle & Manufacturing, and produces axles, driveline systems, chassis systems, crankshafts and chassis components for a variety of European truck and LCV marques.
The AEC plant in Southall closed in 1978 when Marathon production was transferred to Scammell with the loss of 2,150 jobs. The site was subdivided and is mostly now a light industrial and commercial area.
The Guy Motors factory at Fallings Park was closed in 1982 at the cost of 740 jobs.
The Scammell factory in Tolpits Lane, Watford closed in 1988 and is now a housing estate.
The Bathgate plant closed in 1986 with a loss of 2,000 jobs and is now a residential development.
It is indeed a pity that Leyland had to go through more than thirty years of grief to get to where it is now.
Well guys, that’s the way I saw it happen, felt it happen and heard it happen. Feel free to comment.
Thanks for taking the time to post this, great insight to the problems Leyland had suffered.
Dave.
That’s a reasonable account of what happened Tomdhu.But there’s a few questions which seem to arise there.
Firstly it’s a reasonable assumption that the tie up with BMC was one of the main problems in causing massive loss of cash reserves for the group.Ironically most of which can be traced back to Issigonis’ disastrous ideas in the face of ( justified ) market resistance to BMC’s move into the silly front wheel drive poverty spec designs like the Mini and the 1100 etc.IE that’s the basis of why Leyland had no answer to the Cortina and Zodiac range when logically it would/should have been an updated Cambridge and Westminster.In which case BMC ‘might’ then have been in a better position to bring more to the table.As it was even the factory cleaner would have known that BMC was a dead duck which no one with any sense should have touched with a barge pole.The bunch of parasites already having effectively blackmailed Jaguar’s Lyons into a deal having got a strangle hold on his body suppliers. 
As for the truck division the account seems to slightly under estimate just how much damage that AEC’s ongoing foibles caused.IE not withstanding Fogg’s ( or was it Spurrier’s ) failings even their best shotin the form of the 760/TL12,at the end of the day was another unmitigated stroke challenged piece of junk compared to the Rolls Eagle or 14 litre ■■■■■■■■■■ for that matter even the 680 which DAF obviously cleverly noticed.
As for Stokes’ ideas regarding taking the fight to Mercedes that sounds logical.Bearing in mind there was no way of fighting a battle for market share on two fronts against both the Scandinavians and Mercedes.While Stokes would obvIously have been taking a world markets view in which he rightly saw Mercedes as the biggest threat.In which case ‘if’ both he and Lyons had have had the clout to tell BMC to do one and ‘if’ the the TL12 had been the Rolls Eagle and vice versa and ‘if’ Leyland had developed the DAF 2800 cab instead of the T45 and vice versa we might just be telling a very different version of history. 
Thank you Tomdhu for a detailed and interesting history of the catalogue of missed opportunities and sometimes appalling decisions, that was Britain at that time and specifically BMC/Leyland.
John
Carryfast:
That’s a reasonable account of what happened Tomdhu.But there’s a few questions which seem to arise there.Firstly it’s a reasonable assumption that the tie up with BMC was one of the main problems in causing massive loss of cash reserves for the group.
In my original post I didnt express my person choice. I left it for you all to find it. So to short cut the process, yes Wilson’s directive in the so-called “National Interest” was without doubt the biggest reason Leyland was led down the path to destruction. That said it the conquest must have appealed to Stokes’s ego until he quickly found it was a poisoned chalice.As for the truck division the account seems to slightly under estimate just how much damage that AEC’s ongoing foibles caused.IE not withstanding Fogg’s ( or was it Spurrier’s ) failings even their best shotin the form of the 760/TL12,at the end of the day was another unmitigated stroke challenged piece of junk compared to the Rolls Eagle or 14 litre ■■■■■■■■■■ for that matter even the 680 which DAF obviously cleverly noticed.
Fogg was a main board director and Stokes’s appointee. He was super powerful therefor. Nobody could challenge Fogg and his “Blue Sky” thinking. He was all-powerfull but bonkers.As for Stokes’ ideas regarding taking the fight to Mercedes that sounds logical.Bearing in mind there was no way of fighting a battle for market share on two fronts against both the Scandinavians and Mercedes.While Stokes would obvIously have been taking a world markets view in which he rightly saw Mercedes as the biggest threat.In which case ‘if’ both he and Lyons had have had the clout to tell BMC to do one and ‘if’ the the TL12 had been the Rolls Eagle and vice versa and ‘if’ Leyland had developed the DAF 2800 cab instead of the T45 and vice versa we might just be telling a very different version of history.
After the takover, Leyland was in complete control. Lyons had no influence. In 1968 he was made deputy chairman of BLMC- really an honorary role. He had already stepped down as MD of Jaguar in 1967.
Sure the TL12 could have been better but the best could have been the 680 developed like DAF did it. Leyland could have gone to DAF for a licence but didnt.
I dont know what you mean about developing he DAF 2800 cab, sorry.
I’m off to grab some Zzzzzzzzz’s now. More tomorrow!
Evening all,
Tomdhu, at last an insider management angle on the disaster that beffel the UK industry…Thank you, both for your courage in putting this out, and secondly for choosing this medium. Really your opinium deserves more, “oxygen”, simply because there never has been the national understanding of what happened to a major part of the UK industrial activity. Sadly I suspect that there is little appetite, or actual comprehension of what could have been, or what influences destroyed a company.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I think that you may be the first person to give an objective "insiders " view, of what transpired. No doubt what you say will attract some rather perverse opinions,and comments, but please stick to your knowledge and recall of events, it is priceless. Very few people have any comprehension of just how chaotic the actual managerial practices are in a major vehicle producer!
Cheerio for now.
Tomdhu:
Carryfast:
That’s a reasonable account of what happened Tomdhu.But there’s a few questions which seem to arise there.Firstly it’s a reasonable assumption that the tie up with BMC was one of the main problems in causing massive loss of cash reserves for the group.
In my original post I didnt express my person choice. I left it for you all to find it. So to short cut the process, yes Wilson’s directive in the so-called “National Interest” was without doubt the biggest reason Leyland was led down the path to destruction. That said it the conquest must have appealed to Stokes’s ego until he quickly found it was a poisoned chalice.As for the truck division the account seems to slightly under estimate just how much damage that AEC’s ongoing foibles caused.IE not withstanding Fogg’s ( or was it Spurrier’s ) failings even their best shotin the form of the 760/TL12,at the end of the day was another unmitigated stroke challenged piece of junk compared to the Rolls Eagle or 14 litre ■■■■■■■■■■ for that matter even the 680 which DAF obviously cleverly noticed.
Fogg was a main board director and Stokes’s appointee. He was super powerful therefor. Nobody could challenge Fogg and his “Blue Sky” thinking. He was all-powerfull but bonkers.As for Stokes’ ideas regarding taking the fight to Mercedes that sounds logical.Bearing in mind there was no way of fighting a battle for market share on two fronts against both the Scandinavians and Mercedes.While Stokes would obvIously have been taking a world markets view in which he rightly saw Mercedes as the biggest threat.In which case ‘if’ both he and Lyons had have had the clout to tell BMC to do one and ‘if’ the the TL12 had been the Rolls Eagle and vice versa and ‘if’ Leyland had developed the DAF 2800 cab instead of the T45 and vice versa we might just be telling a very different version of history.
After the takover, Leyland was in complete control. Lyons had no influence.
Sure the TL12 could have been better but the best could have been the 680 developed like DAF did it. Leyland could have gone to DAF for a licence but didnt.
I dont know what you mean about developing he DAF 2800 cab, sorry.
It’s good to see acknowledgement of the often down played part which the tie up with BMC did regarding damage to Leyland Group.The propaganda usually trying to paint a positive picture such as the so called ‘brilliance’ of the design of Issigonis’ front wheel drive heaps.Probably not surprising to divert attention from those involved and the damage which that disastrous business decision caused.
In the case of Lyons I was referring to the more or less forced sell out of Jaguar to BMC before the Leyland tie up forming the BMH group.Which just as later with Leyland was a case of BMC trying to use Jaguar’s market position to subsidise its already collapsing empire caused by that change in direction to such down market junk.Which too add insult to injury wasn’t just an inferior option from the customers’ point of view it was also a loss maker in terms of production costs.As opposed to Ford taking over the void left in the Cambridge and Westminster market sectors with the Cortina and Zodiac,and later Granada.While ironically those enthusiasts who often complain about Jaguar’s tie up with Leyland Group seem to selectively miss what might have happened ‘if’ Stokes had turned down the tie up with BMH group.In which case Jaguar would probably have been taken down with BMC and there would have been no XJ6/12 or XJS.On that note much of Leyland’s eventual fate was already sealed by that forced decision by Lyons to sell out to BMC forming BMH.When really BMC needed to be consigned to the scrap heap together with its lousy inferior products at that time.The buy out of Pressed Steel obviously being yet another parasitic tactical move by BMC to save itself thereby pulling down the rest of the UK automotive industry in the form of the eventual Leyland Group in the process.
The final nail for the truck division then obviously being that lack of any credible in house engine option with the exception of the 680 which unbelievably ended up in the hands of DAF.On that note the inferior and seemingly impossible to increase stroke of the TL12 seems to have been set with the 590 and 690 both of which were pre Leyland era AEC designs.So again it would be wrong to blame Stokes for that failing in AEC’s design approach. Although as I’ve said things might have been different even then ‘if’ AEC had kept the apparently ex designer who walked away and who then designed the Rolls Eagle ? and designed it for AEC/Leyland Group instead.As for the DAF cab I didn’t mean that in the literal sense but just a credible competitor to it as opposed to the T45.
That seems to sum up my view of the main points and the hypothetical what if of a Leyland Group in which it had made something along the lines of and preferably even superior to the 2800,instead of DAF.With a car division made up of just Jaguar/Rover/Triumph without the millstone of BMC group around its neck.
Tomdhu, thank you for your concise and knowledgeable insights into a complex subject that has fascinated many people for years. I have to say that your opinions echo very closely those of Robert Fryars, whose opinions I have heard for many years. As you will know, Robert Fryars rose to very senior positions in AEC and then Leyland Motors. Whilst Mr Fryars is more scathing in his opinions of certain people and personalities within British Leyland than you are, like you he is of the opinion that Stanley Markland would have been a much better choice to head up the organisation than Donald Stokes. It is good for me personally that I am now able to read about BL from both an AEC and a Leyland man’s viewpoint and it is pleasing that there is so much common ground within the two opinions.
gingerfold:
Tomdhu, thank you for your concise and knowledgeable insights into a complex subject that has fascinated many people for years. I have to say that your opinions echo very closely those of Robert Fryars, whose opinions I have heard for many years. As you will know, Robert Fryars rose to very senior positions in AEC and then Leyland Motors. Whilst Mr Fryars is more scathing in his opinions of certain people and personalities within British Leyland than you are, like you he is of the opinion that Stanley Markland would have been a much better choice to head up the organisation than Donald Stokes. It is good for me personally that I am now able to read about BL from both an AEC and a Leyland man’s viewpoint and it is pleasing that there is so much common ground within the two opinions.
Hi GF,
Do you know if “Kinda Bob” as we knew him is still alive and if R k Knowles is still around?