Rebirth of England

Chapter 988 Participating in Research and Development

"We focus on the quality of life of every citizen, but we will not neglect the protection of national security as the foundation of our civilized society. Even now, threats against Europe and Britain still exist. On the 17th of this month, the Crimea region of Ukraine split with the support of Russia..."

On March 3, Cameron made a speech in the British Parliament and mentioned:

"So in such a complex situation, we must be able to ensure that we have enough ways to protect Britain, Europe, and our civilized society with common values. This is why I propose that Britain develop a new generation of strategic medium- and long-range missiles together with its European allies such as France, Germany and Italy..."

After the BFT fund returned 140 billion pounds to the British government, Cameron finally became tough again.

It is no wonder that he attaches so much importance to Barron's opinion. After all, in addition to the media platform controlled by the other party, the arrival of this fund can indeed help Cameron to make another repairs to Britain's less than ideal economic recovery in 2014, before the general election, so that Britain can show the public in next year's general election that his term in office is still remarkable.

For example, of the 140 billion pounds, 10 billion pounds was injected into the National Health Service (NHS), which is also an area of ​​people's livelihood where ordinary people can feel the government's policies more clearly.

It can be said that in the UK, if ordinary people get sick, they only need to choose the NHS and wait in line, while rich people need to consider more - which private hospital has better technology.

NHS is the "universal free medical insurance" in the UK. NHS brings together excellent medical staff and medical resources to provide almost free services from seeing a doctor to treatment to hospitalization and surgery.

Well, that's what it looks like on the surface...

I still say the same thing - after we leave, they will build schools and hospitals for you and increase your wages. This is not because they have a change of heart or because they have become good people, but because we have been here.

The first country in the world to achieve universal free medical care was the Soviet Union.

After World War II, facing the Soviet Union's implementation of social welfare such as "8-hour work day, free education, free medical care", Britain was under tremendous pressure. Finally, under the pressure of opposition from some powerful people, it nationalized the hospitals and established the National Health Service (NHS) with the aim of providing free medical care to British citizens.

It must be acknowledged that this system has indeed made great contributions to the health of the British people. Even during the administration of Margaret Thatcher, when state-owned assets were sold on a large scale, she did not dare to privatize NHS hospitals.

Also, at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics, the NHS appeared on the stage as the pride of Britain and won cheers from the audience.

But again, free is the most expensive.

Because the NHS's operating funds come from taxes, and the aging of British society is becoming increasingly serious. In addition, after the subprime mortgage crisis, the British government's revenue has dropped sharply, which has led to the NHS having to bear increasing pressure on universal health care.

Especially after Cameron came to power, in order to cope with the subprime mortgage crisis, he has been reducing government spending - he has reduced government investment in health care from 3.6% to 1.5%...

This means that when people in the UK pay taxes, they actually have to deduct an additional "medical tax".

In addition, using the NHS to see a doctor requires a lot of patience. If it is a minor illness, the doctor will prescribe you a pill and you just need to wait for a week or two. But if you need a CT scan or even surgery, it is normal to wait in line for weeks, months or even a year...

The situation in the UK is not too bad now, but a few years later, when the epidemic breaks out, the waiting list for the UK NHS in 2023 will be as high as 760 million people... At that time, the total population of the UK will be only 6500 million, and more than one-tenth of the people will be queuing to see a doctor. I just want to ask you if you are afraid.

So for minor illnesses and injuries that are not urgent, although the waiting time on the NHS is long, at least it is “free”.

But for emergencies, you need to purchase commercial medical insurance separately, otherwise you can only "heal yourself" while waiting.

It can be said that Cameron's previous cuts in medical investment were also a point of opposition for many people. Now that the funds have been obtained, 10 billion pounds has been injected into the NHS, which has at least been welcomed by many people.

In this case, he took advantage of the fact that Crimea announced a referendum on independence from Ukraine and was incorporated into Russia as an autonomous region on March 3 to promote cooperation between Britain and France, Germany and Italy on the development of strategic medium- and long-range missiles.

In fact, from the perspective of the British government, since it needs to allocate funds every year to purchase the American Trident missiles and the related maintenance and upgrade costs, if the European Missile Group can develop a strategic medium- and long-range missile to replace it, it will also require government funding for configuration. They do not reject the European jointly developed missiles that are more "autonomous".

But what needs to be considered is that, after all, European countries have accumulated technology in this area... but most countries have abandoned it for a long time. Perhaps only France has been maintaining research in related directions. So whether the joint research and development of the four countries based on the European Missile Group can produce satisfactory results after investing funds is still unknown.

Therefore, out of caution, even on the British side, the Cameron government is willing to promote this cooperation, but in the initial stage it is only a symbolic investment of less than 1 million pounds to test the waters.

"In fact, there are objections within BAE Systems regarding investing funds in the European Missile Group to develop related strategic missiles..."

Wang Wanting said to Barron:

"The European Missile Group is not publicly listed, so its research and development relies on funding from the governments of these countries. Specifically, they first evaluate the type of missiles they need and their performance indicators, then allocate a budget for them. After successful research, they provide mature missile products to various countries..."

The problem now is that Cameron does not want to immediately determine the replacement of the Trident missiles currently purchased from the United States. Therefore, the British government will not allocate all the funds, but will only promise to replace them after the research and development is successful, so that the European Missile Group will obtain the corresponding order.

This attitude is naturally out of caution. After all, before the general election, the government is still very sensitive about fiscal spending. With the "supervision" of the opposition parties including the Labour Party and the Liberal Democratic Party, it is easy to find a handle to attack this policy - why not continue to purchase American missiles, whether it is necessary to participate in research and development, whether it will increase the fiscal burden and so on.

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In this case, BAE Systems hesitated to participate in this strategic missile development project without much certainty - because if it confirmed its participation, countries such as France, Germany and Italy might be able to obtain more upfront funding from the government, and then BAE Systems would need to bear a considerable portion of the British investment on its own.

"If that is the case, then we can pay for that through Standard Defence, but ultimately it will have to be done under the name of BAE Systems."

After all, BAE Systems itself is one of the shareholders of the European Missile Group, and its shareholding ratio is very high, the same as the joint shareholding of France and Germany, and higher than Italy's 25% shareholding ratio.

In this case, Standard Defense Group can invest by purchasing convertible bonds issued by BAE Systems, and agree with BAE Systems that if the strategic missile is successfully developed this time, then these convertible bonds will be converted into common stock of BAE Systems - after all, if the strategic missile is successfully developed, it will inevitably be a stable source of income, and BAE Systems is also happy to maintain its holdings in the European Missile Group.

If subsequent research and development proves difficult or requires continued additional investment, the convertible debt held by Standard Defense will be exchanged for a portion of the European Missile Group's shares held by BAE Systems.

BAE Systems is very happy to accept this condition, which can make their risks controllable.

The most it will do is lose part of the shares of the European Missile Group, which will then be held by Standard Defence Group, also a British company.