Manufacturing reshoring: A U.K. perspective

This chapter explores the meaning of reshoring and its drivers in the case of the U.K. manufacturing, with a particular focus on its automotive sector. Using a mixed methods approach, drawing on interviews, policy reviews, and a range of recent surveys, the chapter finds that while reshoring is indeed a discernable trend in the U.K. manufacturing, it is less pronounced than many have claimed. In the U.K. case at least there are severe limits as to how far this reshoring trend can go, particularly in relation to the availability of skills and finance in the supply chain, and the availability of land for manufacturing. This is in turn raises questions over the stance of British industrial policy and whether more could be done, with com parisons made to recent U.S. experience.