Electric Dreams


Electric Dreams

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Nissan - the jewel in the crown of the north-east economy. Once

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clouded with suspicion, it's now Europe's most productive car plant.

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We go behind the scenes as it gambles on becoming the first mass

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producer of all-electric cars. Nissan are taking a huge risk with

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the Leaf because they are the first to market, they've bet the farm on

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it, and it's extremely brave. ask, are Nissan's electric dreams

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on full charge or do they risk OK, so help yourself to hi-viz

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jackets here. A critical day for these people. It could be the start

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of a job which will bring security and the chance to be part of an

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extraordinary north-east industrial story. Every single vehicle you see

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in this plant is a customer's order. There is not a single car that we

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make that will stand in a compound and wait to be sold. For Percy,

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it's a chance for a new career after leaving the Army. I was in

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the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers so it's generally a

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mechanical background that I've been in the past 24 years. Percy is

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one of hundreds who want to work here. With one in 10 people out of

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work on Wearside, Nissan can be choosy about who it hires, With at

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least 10 applicants for every new It takes 59 seconds for the body to

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go past. Not 58 seconds, or one minute, exactly 59 seconds. You

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won't see them running and you won't see them standing still. How

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long do you think it takes us to put that dash in? Someone want to

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give me a guess? 20 seconds? 30? 30 to 50 seconds, yes? Settle down and

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have a look. Here we go, as you pass it through the right side

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front door, I'll start counting, ready? One, two. Two seconds. So

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two seconds is all that it takes to get this dashboard in there. It's

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pretty efficient. I was pretty surprised. It shook me a little bit,

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to see just how quickly these things come together. 3.5 hours to

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produce a car. You've got the timescale, you got a job to do, you

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know exactly what your job is, and you've just got to get on and do it.

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It was like going into a different world, really, it was like going

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into Santa's workshop. All these people working at such a high level

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for such a long period of time is just inconceivable, really. You see

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this white stuff they're putting on the car there? That's to stop bird

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strike - that's the posh word for it! This year, Nissan broke all

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production records at its Sunderland plant, when the 7

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millionth car rolled off the line. And that, gentlemen, is all there

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is to making a Nissan. The time from when you first come into this

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shop to going out the door and putting more than 4,500 parts in

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the car, 3.5 hours. And that, gentlemen, is all there is to it.

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Well, that's regular cars, but what about making - and selling - the

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new electric model? From a marketing point of view, it's an

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absolute nightmare. How do you sell a car like that into a market that

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is absolutely rigid with misinformation and preconceptions?

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Nissan makes one car every four minutes. More than 80 % go to

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It's a success story born out of industrial misery on Wearside 30

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We were close to the end of the decline in traditional industries

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and people were wondering how the city would make its living in

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future. And where would we get the jobs from? There was lots of angst.

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Unemployment in Sunderland specifically was growing rather

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alarmingly and in some ward areas, probably well in excess of 20 %

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John Bridge was working for the Northern Development Company when

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he heard a whisper that Nissan was looking to set up shop in Britain.

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I then go to Tokyo in early March 1981, and as it turned out, the

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first region in the whole of the UK that was able to make a substantial

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presentation to what was then known as the Nissan product team. There

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were fewer pickets outside Austin Rover were Cowley plant today...

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But Britain's poor record of industrial relations, particularly

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in carmaking, was putting off foreign investors. There were

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appalling things going on in the industry as a whole. It did come as

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a bit of a surprise to me that they were as open to doing a deal.

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Foreign car-makers in Britain had been talking more about reducing

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their operations or even leaving completely. They had major concerns

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about the state of the car industry in the UK at the time and they

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didn't want to if you like, to inherit those sort of

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characteristics, so a clean, green field, fresh start type of

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environment was what they were really looking for. Nissan's final

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choice will be from three sites - Sunderland, Humberside and Shotton.

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So against the odds, Nissan signed the deal to build cars in Britain.

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But where was still up for debate. The Japanese have told government

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officials that they will make a decision by the end of this month.

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It was a battle to land the big prize. So, why did Nissan choose a

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disused airfield on Wearside? Thatcher government said, OK, you

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can have this land, for agricultural prices. There was a

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lot of anecdotal stuff, things do the rounds like the blokes in

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Sunderland like a drink after work, but the blokes in the north-west

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like a drink during work. So, the Japanese must have been kind of

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dazzled at all of this contradictory information and to

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have made the decision they did was really, really difficult, but the

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government helped an awful lot. They may well have got some nods

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and winks from the construction industry which spreads obviously

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over the whole kingdom about where industrial relations and worker

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discipline was better than some other places. And I think that the

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north-east came out pretty well in Every connection was milked to

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curry favour. One of the stories that we heard was that there was a

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very famous battleship in the Japanese Navy, that was part of

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some big naval battle it had had with the Russian Empire. And they

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defeated the Russian Navy where they were expected to get trounced.

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And this big battleship was made in But, history can be a double-edged

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sword. The memories of what had happened to, particularly our

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prisoners of war in Japan, were still very real, they were very

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recent. These wounds were still raw. There was an element of saying that

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you couldn't trust the Japanese, that we should maintain a hostile

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attitude towards them. To think that we had all that trouble with

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the Japanese, and they'd been so cruel to us, and there, we were

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going to help them to set up a factory, well, it just didn't seem

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right to any of our prisoners of war. Len Gibson spent all of his

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Second World War in a Japanese prison camp. Many of his old

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comrades protested against Nissan. They had little placards made

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around their chests. They daubed paint on some of the walls, they

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found one of the councillors and bombarded him with questions. And

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gave him a hard time. Despite the opposition, Nissan chose the north-

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east. The Japanese car-makers, Nissan, finally announced where

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they are building their British plant. It is to be at Washington

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TRANSLATION: I feel that this is a most important occasion. The start

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of a new relationship with the people of Sunderland and the north-

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Three decades on, Nissan is ploughing millions into another

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massive leap into the unknown. It's June 2012, and they're working

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around the clock to make the changes needed to build the Leaf.

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We try to make it as simple as possible. You will not put new men

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into a line to build the Leaf vehicle. You will use the people

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that build the Nissan Qashqai, to also build the Leaf. Here, staff

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are being trained on how to fit the battery. We don't know what to

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expect. We don't know if it's going to sell well, or if it's not, but

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it is exciting in that way. If it does sell well, we are the first

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ones to kick it off, so everyone always thinks that Nissan were the

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first ones to go forward. The Leaf, make no mistake about it, is

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compromised because it's only got a 100 mile range and it costs too

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much money although they have recently reduced the price, and it

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really takes too long to charge, but that's a malaise that affects

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all electric cars. Nissan believes everyone should be able to drive

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the future, today. In terms of the way it drives, and the way it looks

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in its interior, it's really very good indeed. It's the market leader.

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So it gets good reviews, but it costs more than �20,000. And that's

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not all. When you're making a petrol car, I don't have to think

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about where the nearest petrol station is. With electric vehicles,

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it is important to know where the nearest charging stations are.

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Nissan is working with the British government on plug-in places to

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develop a charging infrastructure in the UK. Imagine a car factory

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where no-one ever goes on strike. And where no-one is made redundant

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either. Back in the 80s, it was industrial relations that needed a

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fresh approach. The managing director gets just the same as men

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on the line. My advice to them, all the way through, was to deal with

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their workforce inside the factory, in working hours, and not to allow

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meetings to take place in the car park or someone like that, outside

:11:27.:11:37.
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working hours, because then they could be infiltrated by outsiders.

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And they understood quite clearly those messages. Or is this just a

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People were thinking, well, will we have any union deal? Yes, there was

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a lot of trepidation. There was a lot of people wondering how this

:11:57.:12:07.
:12:07.:12:08.

would work out. Nissan insisted on having a one-union deal. I was

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lucky, really, because the union, I was in, it was the union that was

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in when Nissan came over, there was a lot of turmoil in the car

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industry with the unions, and I guess that one of the things Nissan

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looked at was to sort of get an agreement with the one union and,

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that way, they could maybe get through difficulties, but it was a

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lot easier. At the operation in Washington, the royal couple

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painted in the eye of a traditional doll. So, the deal, sweetened by

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multi-million pound government subsidies, stayed on track. The

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plant finally opened in 1986, with ambition that appeared sky-high.

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believe the employees are determined to demonstrate that

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Nissan United Kingdom can, at the least, draw level with and then

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overtake the success and quality APPLAUSE. We were one of the first

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lines that she came to. At that time I was a team leader on the

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chassis section. This was responsible for basically, the

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underfloor of the vehicle. I was very young, 24 years old, probably

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couldn't remember what she said to me at the time, but it was a great

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day. Trevor Mann is now on Nissan's executive board based here in Japan.

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It's a long way since his early days on the production line in

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Sunderland. Trevor was in the first wave of key workers sent here in

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the early 80s to learn the Nissan way of building cars. Whatever

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preparation we could have done, at Sunderland at that time, could

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never have been enough for what we experienced coming into Japan. If

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you haven't been associated with an industry like this, or the car

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industry, you could never imagine what it was like. It was a huge

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:14:26.:14:27.

plant, a huge operation, very busy Since the 80s, thousands of staff

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have been sent from Sunderland to Japan. Since last year, the first

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trip, I've been over nearly three times, I think. To try to

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understand exactly how they do their work, and see what processes

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I can put back into the UK process. And we need to rebuild, now,

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roughly? Today, Les Green is trying to solve a specific problem with

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the Leaf. The area I've been looking at is the glove box, and

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the switch panels on the dashboard and see how we connect them, see

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how we use the same sequences, and whether there are any difficulties

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in that area. They've seen the problems, they fed them back to us,

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this is an opportunity to see those problems in real life and see what

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improvements they've made, so I'm benchmarking against what the

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Japanese have done on the Leaf. You can tell, now, it's starting to go.

:15:16.:15:26.
:15:26.:15:29.

It's not all about building cars. The weekend is a time to get away

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from the factory and do some teambuilding. It's to get away from

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the normal, mundane game of, yes, you're in Japan, normally, where

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ever you go, there's people in a high-rise area. Four it was an

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opportunity for their new lives to see a bit of the country well and

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:16:04.:16:15.

just being in Tokyo, to take them The output from the Sunderland lads

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has not always won universal approval. The first model produced

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was the Nissan Bluebird. It had all the charisma of an old shoe. By the

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time the Nissan Primera and the Micra arrived, we saw this for what

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it was, one of the best car plants in the world. No longer just

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assembling imported parts, the sun ploughed millions into the factory

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to make cars from scratch. I knew that they were doing it seriously,

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then. The minute you put that plant in You're anchoring manufacturing

:16:55.:17:01.

in that location. By the end of the decade, the company had spent more

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than �1 billion in Sunderland, but it was looking overstressed. They

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were starting to lose quite a lot of money. And we were very worried.

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Nissan is heavily in debt, and even though the Sunderland plant is the

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most efficient factory in Europe it is Renault that now calls the shots.

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Renault made a significant cash injection into the company. Renault

:17:34.:17:39.

know how we to greater productivity, new models and more jobs. But

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then... It has been a day of turmoil on the money markets.

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credit crunch lead to an overnight slump in sales. The company was

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forced to do a U-turn on its job- for-life pledge, and one-fifth of

:17:57.:18:01.

the workforce was laid off. security is one of the biggest

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things. It was a massive shock. That was a very difficult time

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indeed, for the plant manager but for her everybody involved,

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particularly the employees and their families who are obviously

:18:17.:18:23.

felt threatened. The company rode out the recession thanks to the

:18:23.:18:27.

popularity of new models and a favourable exchange rate. 2,000

:18:27.:18:32.

more staff have been taken on. Nissan is now the linchpin of the

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local economy. For every one job at the Sunderland plant there are

:18:37.:18:42.

another four in the supply chain. In the north-east we have just over

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1100 people at a facility set up to supply the sand. Poor growth has

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none of their expansion plans. Without them we would not be you

:18:53.:18:58.

run the north-east. This is the final inspection the area for the

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instrument panel. We send a vehicle down every two hours. This time

:19:02.:19:09.

tomorrow these instrument panels will be in a finished state. Nissan

:19:09.:19:14.

insists suppliers take on his regimented way of working. There is

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one cockpit module delivered every minute. The company has cut staff

:19:19.:19:23.

embedded in the manufacturing. is the point rubber cockpit modules

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are delivered to Nissan, fitted by the manipulator of you can see

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behind me. 30,000 people and their families, all those people are

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taking money into the MetroCentres of this world, and the leisure

:19:42.:19:50.

centre, so without Nissan, there would be a big hole. Iowa just

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watch you and the time you to make sure that you're doing the job well.

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It is late summer, 2012. The latest batch of recruits, including former

:19:59.:20:04.

soldier, Percy, our man on the shop floor. Things have to be done at a

:20:04.:20:09.

certain time. It is very rare that the deadline is missed. A lot of

:20:10.:20:14.

organisations, if you are five minutes later it is not a big drama,

:20:14.:20:19.

but at Nissan, you have to be on time, so does the army, so there is

:20:19.:20:24.

that discipline within the sun, and you talk about the subtle

:20:24.:20:28.

differences between soldiers and civilians. Civilians say no, which

:20:28.:20:34.

is something I am not used to. new staff and work in very

:20:34.:20:37.

different conditions from the heat and noise of the rest of the

:20:37.:20:44.

factory, the ones to make the batteries. And the battery plant

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you do not realise the level of technology that is being developed

:20:49.:20:56.

to make this a commercial success. This process is wasp more or less

:20:56.:21:00.

100% automated, with very little manual intervention. High-speed

:21:00.:21:10.
:21:10.:21:20.

Over the years, hundreds of Japanese families have been coming

:21:20.:21:24.

to the north east to work on the sun and their suppliers. And some

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have settled permanently. Today's event is the annual meeting of the

:21:31.:21:41.
:21:41.:21:41.

North East Japanese Women's Association. And thank you for that.

:21:41.:21:51.
:21:51.:21:54.

The event is organised by Sayoko Smith. In the north-east people do

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care about us and about people in general. It is a wonderful

:21:58.:22:06.

community. When I first came here which was 8.5 years ago, I could

:22:06.:22:16.
:22:16.:22:22.

not understand a word. But she is now an expert. Any Mayuki works at

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Nissan. My job is to help people settle to get accommodation, to

:22:31.:22:37.

find a GP and open a bank account. The children, they do not have to

:22:37.:22:41.

worry about at all, because they adapt very quickly to the new

:22:41.:22:47.

culture. North-east people are just like us, very friendly, who want to

:22:47.:22:54.

get to know a lot about Japan and they are kind in reality, if you

:22:54.:23:04.
:23:04.:23:07.

make friends once, this lasts for a October the 2012 and it is a red

:23:07.:23:14.

letter day at Nissan. Once a preparation and many million pounds

:23:14.:23:19.

spent, and today, the Nissan leaf is on the production line. These

:23:19.:23:23.

lads have only ever bought one model on the line, so this is

:23:23.:23:27.

something different for them. last nut and bolt is checked and

:23:27.:23:34.

double-checked. In has, the car is getting rave reviews. It is quite a

:23:34.:23:44.
:23:44.:23:50.

nice car. But it is not without teething problems. What's

:23:50.:23:59.

happening? Can use lower down and get this out? -- can you slow it

:23:59.:24:07.

down? We have a trapped harness. You will need to get that. Put that

:24:07.:24:13.

down as a concern, so that it does not happen again. The big test is

:24:13.:24:20.

the battery. Get it married up to the car, and then once it is done

:24:20.:24:25.

will say that was OK, then it drops down, and the battery is secure. It

:24:25.:24:35.
:24:35.:24:36.

has gone pretty well. We get it down from four an hour, to three an

:24:36.:24:42.

hour, and then it all depends on sales from then on. So far, Nissan

:24:42.:24:50.

has sold 55,000 worldwide, half of the 100,000 that it had hoped for.

:24:51.:24:55.

Not everybody is going to get this technology and jump into an

:24:55.:24:59.

electric vehicle but what we have demonstrated with the Nissan leaf

:24:59.:25:09.
:25:09.:25:43.

Traditionally, Japan cast the die for Nissan's 14 million global

:25:43.:25:48.

workforce, training them at its mother plant, but now, Sunderland

:25:48.:25:51.

are shearing and that responsibility. Sunderland as the

:25:51.:26:00.

most reliable by Japanese people and then we ask Sunderland to take

:26:00.:26:05.

care all those European, African and Middle East and India area, as

:26:05.:26:13.

a global mother plant. The parent company places trust in the plant,

:26:13.:26:18.

in terms of breeding than the San DNA into overseas plants, so it is

:26:18.:26:27.

a further in the cap, a reward for many years of hard work. -- feather

:26:27.:26:37.

in the cap. St Petersburg, a far cry from Wearside, but Nissan's new

:26:37.:26:43.

factory is a carbon copy of the Sunderland plant. It was built by a

:26:43.:26:48.

team from the north-east. It was a throwback. The Japanese guys have

:26:48.:26:52.

been educating me. Who would have thought that a local guy would be

:26:52.:26:58.

sitting in Russia educating people on this and construction?

:26:58.:27:01.

English colleagues have a great help. The Russian people are very

:27:01.:27:08.

friendly, open and honest and culturally very similar to last.

:27:08.:27:14.

get constant support and assistance from the mother plant in Sunderland.

:27:14.:27:18.

There are those who say that you could take all the things you've

:27:18.:27:22.

got in Sunderland now and just dump it somewhere else, with much

:27:22.:27:26.

cheaper labour cost economy. I do not think you can do that because

:27:26.:27:31.

so much work has gone in and the quality is so high, that it would

:27:31.:27:40.

be difficult to replicate that in Russia, China or India. So the 8th

:27:40.:27:44.

new model rolls off the line in Sunderland. It is now up to Nissan

:27:44.:27:49.

customers to decide whether its electric dreams come true. The car

:27:49.:27:52.

has been produced behind me are the best possible rebuke to those who

:27:53.:27:58.

say that in Britain, we cannot design things any more, we cannot

:27:58.:28:03.

make things any more, we cannot export things any more. It is a

:28:03.:28:09.

great pity the British car industry isn't still British owned.

:28:09.:28:15.

course we are a Japanese company, but when a car leaves here, it is a

:28:15.:28:19.

British car. It does make you feel proud to put these for vehicles on

:28:19.:28:25.

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