Holden snubs Canberra

[Taily]

Holden snubs the government - Full article at SMH.com

Holden has withdrawn further from communication with the federal government.

A delegation of car industry workers and union officials will arrive in Canberra for talks with government officials on Tuesday without representatives from the Holden factory floor.

''Unfortunately, Holden indicated that it would not release any representatives to go to Canberra," said John Camillo, South Australian state secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union.

"They said they didn't want to play any politics and didn't want to release them."

The delegation will be made up of representatives from Toyota, Ford and car parts manufacturers.

''As far as I know they have never done that before. I gave them plenty of notice," Mr Camillo said.

The snub is the second from Holden which last week turned down a government request to meet a visiting executive from its US owner General Motors.

Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane had asked to meet GM's head of operations in the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, Stefan Jacoby. He said the snub showed "a lack of sensitivity" towards the state of the industry.

It followed General Motors' decision last month to shift its Australian chief Mike Devereux to Shanghai by the end of the year.

Mr Devereux had sealed a deal with the previous Labor government to continue to make cars in Adelaide until 2022 and to continue to maintain a design presence at Port Melbourne. The agreement signed by prime minister Julia Gillard cost the federal government $215 million, the South Australian government $50 million and the Victorian government $10 million.

Mr Camillo said workers wanted information.

"The shop stewards are copping pressure from the workers every day asking what's happening. Every day they are reading something in the paper. They want us to do something and they keep asking us - what is the decision, what's happening?" he said.

The change of the government and the new minister's decision to refer the question of car industry support to the Productivity Commission rather than honour Labor's agreement meant Holden had already missed the deadline for gearing up to retool its production line during the Christmas break.

"If you are going to make new models you need to take advantage of downtime,'' Mr Camillo said. ''They would have worked around the clock for those nine days reconfiguring the production line and then come back at Easter. That opportunity has gone now."

If Holden withdraws from Australia after its present models expire in 2016 Toyota is likely to follow. Ford has already announced its intention to leave in 2016. The withdrawal of all three manufacturers would lead to the withdrawal of the component parts manufacturers. About 200,000 jobs are at risk - one-fifth of the 1 million-odd workers employed in manufacturing.

There are a lot of jobs that, while not employed directly with the three manufacturers are key to their operations in other parts of the industry - these jobs are all on the line. I'm not one who would usually stand for governement hand-outs but the situation we see now is proof that government policies allowing the flood of cheap imports (and the dumping of almost end of line higher end Euro models) into the country over the last 15-20 years has not worked in our own favour. That, coupled with our wage structure and high standard (read cost) of living means that the local manufacturing processes will never be compeditive against imports with a lower cost base. I cannot for the life of me understand why successive governments of both political leanings could not see this scenario playing out...

I feel that the industry can be saved from the loss of all three manufacturers (OK, we know that Ford is gone after the next Falcon) if they act now - which is why I find Holden's stance on these talks a bit odd. I guess they have their reasons if these talks are not really what the government says they are (why are the unions involved if not to muscle the companies into massive redundancy pay-outs), besides Holden already believe they have the funding in place to carry through until 2020 (though I would bet a penny to a pound the Coalition are not about to honour that one and will leave them high and dry...). Mike Devereux is already just about packed if he isn't already out of the country for good so I guess Holden is just going to stick to the plan and if they don't get what they want they'll probably just pull the pin early.

Not good...

[Taily]

Found this while I was trolling around the place: Holden workers walk out over redundancy dispute

Under a plan put forward by the company, payments would be capped at a set level, of pay for 52 weeks of employment.

Fair dinkum? Most workers in the country would be lucky to get 1/3, if not 1/4 of those redundancy entitlements, even if they have been with the same employer for 30 years. No wonder Holden are getting out with unions broking deals like that. I'm all for unions and the good work they do (I am a member of one myself) but this sort of makes it look to me like they've priced themselves out of a job?

[Vombil]

It's the end consumer that seems to have voted with their wallets. Imports are cheaper and have more saftey features and fruit or at least for the money. I agree, in hind sight it seems so obvious that things were headed this way. I wonder if the same is true in the states? Are there truck loads of imports there? It's fairly upsetting when you drive to work and get excited to see a VF in any guise.

[mckackie]

Yes….we have definitely priced ourselves out of the labour market with the work conditions we now have in Aust.

Some say it started with Gough, then was taken further under Hawke-keating under "free fade agreements" (with Asian manufacturing partners)…..I can specifically recall Keating and Sen. Button proudly announcing they had "rationalised the car industry", which translated to the lowering of import tarriffs,(on new cars) easing the percentage of Australian made component content, and the legislation for redundancy packages for workers.

It's quite sad to say, that while our work force enjoys the best conditions in the world, the payoff has been the loss of ALL manufacturing sector jobs to off-shore locations, and while it is prudent economic strategy to subsidise car manufacture here, if things keep going the way they are, with a high dollar, high labour costs, and the increased import duty K Rudd imposed on imported new car and re-pro parts, it's only putting off the inevitable.

I had a good discussion with Alan Hay, who ran under the Nationals ticket at the last election, and he is also involved directly with many car clubs throughout Australia (I can't remember the exact organisation) and he was able to highlight the in-direct threat the whole industry is facing.

[Blocker]

Good post there mckackie!

[Taily]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-0...016-17/5138942

Well, there goes the baby out with the bathwater after 20+ years of failed governement policy....

Between Ford and Holden pulling the pin together I would hazard a guess that the (at a guess) 5-20,000 (odd?) people employed in support industries might find the employment scene a little bleak after they get left high and dry.

I am also interested as to what both manufacturers closures will to to the national ecconomy's bottom line....

[SLR_dave]

Hmmmn, I'd hold my hope in there for a bit; the "source" is an un-named Coalition MP. Neither Holden or GM have made any statement yet. I heard a month or so ago that many (about 40% I heard) of the current cabinet are against continued subsidy of Australian auto manufacturers (a bit blind in my opinion, considering the overall return in jobs and economic sustenance which maintains growth) however, this means the source, not being named as the 'leaker', could well be misinformed, or have their own agenda, it could be pure untruth. Chris Uhlman hints at this.

The decision is not due for a while yet, if at all. (It seems to me its actually partly Australians speculation of fear of GM's intention here in Aust that drives this worry).
Also, if (for instance) a government created the idea all was lost, it would look as though it had saved the day if Holden stays, - for a few years more at least ...without doing anything!

That said, Macfarlane seems to have been locked out of a factory meet with recent visiting GM heads, (but that could be media spec too), however, I spose the last thing you want when you're a genuinely assessing a manufacturing asset in an OS country, is a government minister walking beside you. (lol - mnnn - maybe not lol.)

But yep, its a worry.

The pious and 'morally better than the rest of us' edges of the Australian media have been hacking into Holden for months now in my observation, (despite the poor education they demonstrate) - all that crap about Holden not making cars Australians want to buy at 'our' expense etc... seems to me like Holden got it pretty right for the last 60 years or so, right on target for the requirement of an Australian car actually, if you consider FX to VF!
And now look at that, a week or so ago VF Commodore is back up at number 3 best seller in the country.

She'll be right.... fingers crossed for luck.

[mckackie]

Definitely take all these media reports with a grain of salt……just look where they are coming from - ABC and fairfax. Blind Freddy can see these two media houses are now socialist heavy organisations, and ever since the federal election they have made Abbot bashing a national sport. We only need to look at the Indo spy non-sense, and many other hysterical stories that originate from Fairfax and ABC to see this. Their aim is to create as many headaches as possible for the new government because they simply don't agree with the Liberal Party ideals. I feel confident the current government will keep Holden going in Australia, and if the dollar keeps falling I would say it's a certainty. Don't forget, they also produce vehicles for over seas markets still, which may end up being the bread and butter.
Also I have connections close to GM-H who will know for sure, so as I get any updates I will post them.
Meanwhile, tell everyone who buys a Korean, German, Chinese or Japanese car they are hurting Australias economy.

[Dr Terry]

It's the end consumer that seems to have voted with their wallets. Imports are cheaper and have more saftey features and fruit or at least for the money.

This is not actually true. The Commodore is currently the no. 2 selling car (no. 1 if you include the ute).

Also there is no cheaper RWD car of any size which is cheaper than Commodore, so 'fruit' doesn't come into it.

Safety features!! Are you serious ? What import has better (or more) safety features than Commodore.

Dr Terry

[Valencia]

Listen to the doctor he knows his shit