Why we should buy Australian

The agreement you speak of became nullified when GM USA and the GFC changed the playing field.

To survive GM USA announced it would bring manufacturing "home" to the USA to protect domestic jobs... this included a loan from the US treasury..

GM had NO intention of keeping Australian manufacturing of its vehicles, hence global platforms etc...

Not to mention in Australia manufacturers continued to sell vehicles which were no longer the primary choice of consumers. No point making what the public wasn't buying...

Sorry you had to leave your career and I hope you found something since then.

However, don't confuse manual labour with skilled labour - having been highly involved with Mitsubishi Engjneers and production staff it's hardly rocket science.
It's manual, repetitive and tiring..

The GFC was the nail in the coffin, as US held companies struggled to survive and made decisions that globally impacted local production.

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Originally Posted by PAT303

I regularly tell people to buy parts from O/S instead of here,I do it for good reason,an example is my heater matrix,$52 Aus from the UK,5 day delivery time,from an Oz supplier,$405 with a 5 day delivery time,now you tell me why should I buy from an Oz company and pay them $353 to order a part from O/S when it took me 3 minutes to do myself?.I also look at the vehicle industry,Ford and Holden went bust because they cannot compete with cheap imports,thats the general consensus anyway,well why can't they compete when they only spend about $150 on R/D,most of that is working out how to fit a crate motor into what ever heap of **** they were making at the time when Land Rover can make the most advanced 4wd vehicles on the road,all made in the UK with HIGHER costs than we have because of the strength of the pound and not only survive but thrive,selling the highest number of the most advanced vehicles you will find anywhere over the last couple of years?.Australian companys have gone bust because they sell a rubbish product or a product they want to sell instead of a product the customer wants to buy for and inflated price with the WORST absolute WORST customer service you will find anywhere. Pat

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Pat where did you get the idea of $150 R&D from ?......Holden spent $1Billion dollars bringing the VE commodore to market...$500 million to design the vehicle from the ground up and $500 million on assembly plant modernization... It was the biggest project ever undertaken by any automotive manufacturer in Australia!

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Originally Posted by Tombie

The agreement you speak of became nullified when GM USA and the GFC changed the playing field.

To survive GM USA announced it would bring manufacturing "home" to the USA to protect domestic jobs... this included a loan from the US treasury..

GM had NO intention of keeping Australian manufacturing of its vehicles, hence global platforms etc...

Not to mention in Australia manufacturers continued to sell vehicles which were no longer the primary choice of consumers. No point making what the public wasn't buying...

Sorry you had to leave your career and I hope you found something since then.

However, don't confuse manual labour with skilled labour - having been highly involved with Mitsubishi Engjneers and production staff it's hardly rocket science.
It's manual, repetitive and tiring..

The GFC was the nail in the coffin, as US held companies struggled to survive and made decisions that globally impacted local production.

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That's actually not true Tombie the deal was all systems go until our current government decided not to honor it ,the agreement was most definitely still in place after GM went into bankruptcy in the US ,and even more interesting was the fact that only two GM facilities outside USA were making a profit at the time of the GFC ,one was Shanghai GM and the other was GMH !

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Originally Posted by Tombie

The agreement you speak of became nullified when GM USA and the GFC changed the playing field.

To survive GM USA announced it would bring manufacturing "home" to the USA to protect domestic jobs... this included a loan from the US treasury..

GM had NO intention of keeping Australian manufacturing of its vehicles, hence global platforms etc...

Not to mention in Australia manufacturers continued to sell vehicles which were no longer the primary choice of consumers. No point making what the public wasn't buying...

Sorry you had to leave your career and I hope you found something since then.

However, don't confuse manual labour with skilled labour - having been highly involved with Mitsubishi Engjneers and production staff it's hardly rocket science.
It's manual, repetitive and tiring..

The GFC was the nail in the coffin, as US held companies struggled to survive and made decisions that globally impacted local production.

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Tombie ,firstly thank you for the nice wishes I did find re employment ,I went back to my trade as a Linesman ( overhead power ) ,and I do agree that a lot of manufacturing / assembly tasks are manual rather unskilled labour ,however its a sad and sobering fact that industries are disappearing all over our country and how sad it is for the likes of highly trained engineering staff that have little prospect of ongoing employment here .

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We live in very shortsighted times. Political and fiscal expediency outweighs human innovation, knowledge and decency everywhere we turn.

Vehicle manufacturing represents far more than jobs. Production is identity. Consumption is veneer. We are at grave risk of becoming a vacuously expensive society entirely reliant on imports.

Unfortunately what gmh, ford and toymota needed was a true levelling of the field , one where we gave the same incentives on exports as Germany , Korea USA and China.
The numbers don't sell locally is only justified if you eliminate exports which is what our govts did.
If you look at numbers sold locally, ( domestic country of production)there would be nothing made by bmw except the 1 and maybe 3 series, Merc would only make c class's and maybe A , VW wouldn't make the toerag ,Passat or anything larger than a golf.
There would be no JLR in the uk at all, except for maybe evoke, but without exports JLR would have been dead long long ago.
The same thing is happening to a lot of large manufacturers here as other countries realise opening and developing heavy industry lifts their people's income ,education and health. Also supplying more income to the govt itself;)
We seem to have forgoten that.:(

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Originally Posted by MrLandy

..... We are at grave risk of becoming a vacuously expensive society entirely reliant on imports.

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Looking around, I think we are there already :eek: :eek:

We're even buying our Army uniforms from China. Seriously?
Talk about short-sightedly abandoning our own economy to save a few bucks. What will happen if we ever have to fight the Chinese?
New Army dress uniforms being made in China to achieve 'best value for money' - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Good on the people behind Patriot Campers for deciding to keep manufacturing in Australia as they expand into the US market.


Third generation manufacturing shows Australia still in the game

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Originally Posted by DiscoMick

We're even buying our Army uniforms from China. Seriously?
Talk about short-sightedly abandoning our own economy to save a few bucks. What will happen if we ever have to fight the Chinese?
New Army dress uniforms being made in China to achieve 'best value for money' - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

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It's quite simple Mick. We simply ask which ships of the invading fleet are carrying our supplies and try not to sink them.
Seriously though: It really is short sighted, dismissive of history and just plain foolhardy not to ensure that we have a broad ability to manufacture, supply our own energy and keep a comprehensive skills base ticking over.