A decision by supermarket Sainsbury’s to extend its credit payment to UK suppliers from 30 days to 75 days for settlement of their accounts after delivery of goods combined with a Chinese manufacturer being paid 50% with order and 50% before the goods leave Chinese shores, exemplifies the arrogance and opportunism of the great and the good in our society.
Cash flow is the lifeblood of businesses and small businesses in particular but this kind of preferential treatment which favours Chinese manufacturers is damaging and in some cases killing our own manufacturers.
A supplier to a large supermarket will take an order in June from the supermarket (say Christmas baubles) and order them from China with 50% cash ‘up front’. The Chinese manufacturer fulfils the order and the second 50% of the cash is sent to China before the order leaves the docks. On arrival in the UK the supplier processes and delivers the goods to the supermarket (say September/October). 30 days, and up to 120 days later the supplier is paid for the order.
The Chinese manufacturer has produced the goods and the UK supermarket has retailed the goods all at the expense of the supplier working on UK bank money. It is a cash flow nightmare.
Is it any wonder that the Chinese have huge investments in UK and US government loan stock (gilts) earning interest on what is essentially our money, having been paid in advance for goods that the British retailer/supplier is paying interest on, at a far more exorbitant rate, before waiting what will now be 75 days from Sainsbury’s, to get paid for their endeavours.
Why is this government telling energy suppliers how much profit they should earn when their so called economic advisers do not appear to have pointed out the very basic shortcomings of business enterprise where Sainsbury’s can even think they can get away with arbitrarily moving from a 30 day to a 75 day account settlement regime, which is damaging our own home-based suppliers.
China has all the money because it demanded it in its terms of trade. British manufacturers are poorly resourced because they have contracts drawn up by ‘clever’ lawyers that allow this payment injustice to be perpetrated. It is wrong and if Mr Cameron and his government would divert their focus from the energy companies to the small business sector then they might well be able to put those clever lawyers out of business.
Terence O’Halloran is a chartered financial planner of Lincoln-based O’Halloran Financial Management Services.
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A 38-year-old man from a North Lincolnshire village charged with murder will face an eight-day trial later this year.
Emergency services were called at 4.23am on Saturday, July 2 to reports that a man was seriously injured on South Parade in central Doncaster.
The 28-year-old victim was taken to hospital but was sadly pronounced dead a short time later.
A post-mortem examination found that he died of injuries to his head, chest and abdomen.
Formal identification of the victim is yet to take place, South Yorkshire Police said earlier this week.
Steven Ling, 38, of Park Drain, Westwoodside in North Lincolnshire, has been charged with murder and was remanded in custody to appear at Doncaster Magistrates Court on Monday, July 4.
Ling later appeared at Sheffield Crown Court on Tuesday, July 5 for a plea and trial preparation hearing.
No pleas were entered during the hearing, but an eight-day trial was set for November 28, 2022. Ling has now been remanded into custody until the next hearing.
The Lincolnite went on a ride-along with a Lincolnshire Police officer from the force’s Roads Policing Unit (RPU), which aims to disrupt criminals’ use of the roads and reduce the number of serious and fatal accidents.
The team will support the county response including local policing, neighbourhood policing and criminal investigation too.
Operations first began in Grantham in January this year and started in Louth earlier this week with a sergeant and nine PCs based in both locations.
The Lincolnite went out on a ride-along with PC Rich Precious from Lincolnshire Police’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
PC Rich Precious has been a police officer for 22 years after joining the force in 2000 and he recently rejoined the Roads Policing Unit, working out of Louth.
PC Precious, who also previously worked as a family liaison officer for road deaths for 16 years, took The Lincolnite out in his police car to the A1 up to Colsteworth and then back to Grantham. He described that particular area as “one of the main arterial routes that goes through Lincolnshire”.
PC Rich Precious driving down the A1 up to Colsterworth. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
Speaking about the new Roads Policing Unit, he said: “It’s intelligence led policing, it’s targeted policing in areas that have been underrepresented in terms of police presence, on the roads certainly, over a number of years.
“We’re hoping that the development of this unit will help address that balance, and look towards using the ANPR system to prevent criminals’ use of the road, and to identify key areas or routes where there’s a high percentage of people killed or seriously injured on the road, what we commonly refer to as KSI.
PC Precious is helping to keep the roads safer in Lincolnshire. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
When asked if he thinks the new team will help reduce the number of serious and fatal accidents in the county, he added: “That’s what the the unit designed for. Sadly, in Lincolnshire our road network does seem to incur a number of those KSI accidents year on year, and we need to reduce that.
“I’ve worked additionally in my roles as a family liaison officer on road death for 16 years, so I’ve seen first hand the impact that road death has on families and victims families.
“I know it’s important that we try and reduce those because, it’s very sad to see how a fatal road traffic collision can affect a family and the victims of that family.”
Marc Gee, Inspector for Lincolnshire Police’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
Marc Gee, Inspector for the Roads Policing Unit, told The Lincolnite: “Every day there will be officers on duty from both teams and they’ll cover the whole county or the county’s roads.
“Eventually, we’ll have nine police cars and we’ve got six motorbikes. We’ll be utilising them with as many officers as we can every day basically to make our roads safer and enforce against the criminals who feel like it’s okay to come into the county and use our road for criminal purposes.”
Lincolnshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner Marc Jones at the launch of the force’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
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