THE TELEGRAPH: Could the US backlash against BP extend to other British companies, asks Tom Leonard
When the US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar promised to keep “the boot on the neck of British Petroleum” over its giant Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the Republican Rand Paul rounded on the White House for being “really un-American” in attacking business.
If so, almost everyone is guilty of un-American activities, as the US has declared open season on the British oil giant. Just 50 yards up the street from The Daily Telegraph’s Manhattan office, the local BP petrol station had its sign daubed in paint the colour of drilling mud last week when 200 protesters turned up. “BP – a bunch of ----ing murderers!” said the message on a protester’s T-shirt. The chant was better: “BP, your heart is black, you can have your oil back.”
There have been similar protests at BP outlets across America and a call for a boycott which appears to have been roundly ignored. The demonstrations may be primarily anti-corporate and anti-oil but occasionally nationality of the corporation slips out. In New Orleans, a demonstrator stood on a Union flag. “We are all at the mercy of BP, a British-owned company,” wailed a Louisiana seaplane company boss in a letter to her senator after she was barred from taking US journalists to a possibly oily beach.
Notwithstanding the irony of a situation in which Americans are accusing a European corporation of putting “profits before people”, it is difficult to recall a more vicious backlash against a company here. The question of whether BP would have received so much vitriol if the initials had stood for, say, Boston Petroleum, has concerned those who worry about the implications for US-UK relations.
Although there is no sign of such a backlash at present, British officials in the US are concerned that if BP continues to fail to plug the leak or if it faces criminal charges, then other British businesses could suffer. >>> Tom Leonard | Saturday, June 05, 2010
