News: Holden to pull out of Australia from 2016, according to senior Government ministers

Paul_The_Aussie

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Holden has made the decision to pull out of Australia as early as 2016, according to senior Government ministers.

The ABC has been told the announcement was supposed to be made this week but has been put off until early next year.

Holden says its discussions with the Government are continuing, and it does not respond to speculation.

Despite several of his colleagues believing Holden is leaving, Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane says that is not his understanding.

The Federal Opposition has warned Holden would make the decision before Christmas if the Government did not announce an assistance package for the industry before then.

The Government has previously said it would wait for the findings of a Productivity Commission inquiry, due in March.

More to come.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-05/holden-to-pull-out-of-australia-from-2016-17/5138942

And there's another nail in AU manufacturing...
 
Wont be good if true. They say for every person directly employed by Holden there are another three people employed in supply and logistics industries who are going to feel the pinch which is why I've always been supportive of government funding for Holden, Ford and Toyota. I'd sooner see my tax dollars go to these manufacturers to keep people employed in useful capacities rather than place further strain on our already over burdened welfare system.

With the departure of Holden, it wont be good news for the City of Playford as there are already a lack of employment and education opportunities in the northern suburbs of Adelaide without adding another 3000 or so newly unemployed to the system. While most will probably find other work or be retrained in other industry sectors (aged care workers are increasingly in demand), they probably wont enjoy the ludicrously high salary or the benefits they had at Holden, and some will be simply unemployable in any industry. The net result is it will probably end up costing South Australian tax payers more to have to support them in some way or another.
 
I thought Holden was AU only, what other countries are they present in? Seems like a stupid idea to me but I bet the big wigs at Ford think Christmas has come early.
 
I thought Holden was AU only, what other countries are they present in? Seems like a stupid idea to me but I bet the big wigs at Ford think Christmas has come early.

I'm pretty sure they sell Holdens in Singapore and Papua New Guinea, and I know they sell them in NZ.
 
I find the reporting of this "story" to be most unsatisfactory thus far.

They don't name any of the sources ("senior Government ministers"). The only minister they mention (Ian MacFarlane), the minister responsible for the Automotive Industry, says he has spoken to Holden and they have denied the reports. If you saw the reporter's account on Lateline, he said that government officials "believed" Holden would pull out and that this "could" be as soon as 2016 ... the written article doesn't reflect this degree of uncertainty.

The reporter is Chris Uhlmann, who is married to Gai Brodtmann, a member of the ALP opposition. He goes on to rapidly involve the opposition spokesman for industry (Kim Carr) in the discussion, who politicises the story .. government disunity etc etc.

I think the whole story is a disgusting beat up, and Chris Uhlmann is trying to talk the workers at Holden (and it's suppliers) out of a job many years earlier than will eventually occur. Maybe Holden will announce they are pulling out early next year but nothing has been announced. It is pure speculation, that will do nothing other than ruin Christmas for the families of Holden workers. Nice one, Mr Uhlmann!

Only a sublime optimist would think that Holden will stay indefinitely. The industry is in its death throws. Mitsubishi has gone (despite government support), Ford has announced it's departure (despite government support), Holden and Toyota have both axed more jobs this year. Sales figures for the vehicles produced here have been in decline for many years and neither Holden, nor Toyota, seem inclined (or able) to make cars here that are attractive to the local market. You don't need to be a "senior Government minister" to speculate on this.

The only thing I am unsure about is, when the automotive manufacturing industry closes in Australia, will the government revoke the luxury car tax? This was originally introduced by the Hawke government in the 80s to protect the local industry from Australians who wanted to buy a European made vehicle.
 
How sad. Between Ford ceasing Australian production and this, will there be any auto industry left down under? Also, will GM start importing vehicles from NA plants and slapping on Holden badges or will the name be dying too?
 
And I believe the answer to that is no, so Holden now will become just another GM badge job.
 
Yeah, I'm seeing this as a lot of speculation and not much substance at the moment. Of course Holden will leave, but I'm waiting for a more official announcement before we can start pinning down dates. I'd be very surprised if they retreat out of local manufacturing before Ford goes in October 2016.
 
Aren't they only making the Commodore? All other cars are all imported and rebadged I think.
 
Only 82172 vehicles produced last year, that's not alot...

holden.GIF
 
Shame on the ABC for even reporting this mass speculation. Over the years, the media certainly hasn't done Ford, Holden and Toyota any favors.

I get the feeling that this was put out by the Liberal ministers so if/when Holden announce they're not going to continue after 2016, they can just go "hey guys, we don't you that they were going to leave no matter what!". This is just a sham to hide the fact that Abbott doesn't want to help them at all, no matter what. This is all completely ignoring the effect on the economy and the return we'd get from assisting the industry. Besides, even countries like Germany receive assistance from their governments.

But Abbott would clearly let a whole industry die rather than admit that subsiding works, because it would mean that the Labor Party is right.

This is just more evidence that our current government sees no value in investment - which is surprising when they have new product that has started to sell very well (the SS-V Redline even has a waiting list!), and have (albeit small) new export programs that are just starting. If we were well into 2014 and the VF and it still wasn't selling, fair enough. But everyone is jumping on the bandwagon calling the Commodore a failure, but basing their arguments that it wasn't selling earlier this year when EVERYONE knew that the new model was around the corner.

Just let the new model sell for a full financial year instead of playing politics with entire industry. All this will achieve is screwing over hard working people in my home town.
 
Even if your government dumped a metric fucktonne of money on them to try to keep Ford and GM there, that's not going to solve the real underlying problem. As I said in the thread last spring:

News flash, GM isn't too happy about the supplier issue in .AU right now either. I wouldn't be surprised at all if GM pulls the eject handle on Aussie production in the next 5 years.

The problem isn't 'not enough financial blandishments or investments' per se, it's your local unions being ridiculous and disrupting the supply chain or worse putting suppliers out of business. Again, reposts with citation links:

In this case, they are to at least some degree. They have been agitating at various .AU suppliers of Ford, demanding higher wages and there's just no room to give - so the .au suppliers are going bankrupt and closing up shop instead. So instead of some jobs for some wages, they're getting no jobs and no wages and Ford can't rely on their local suppliers. Some of these suppliers are so on the edge that they can't even make their rent any more. And the unions demand more money - blood from a turnip, anyone?

Case in point: http://www.news.com.au/national/car...closes-factories/story-fndo4cq1-1226434919109

If you can't rely on local suppliers in .au, why bother making cars there?

Ford and GM rely on the same general 'cloud' of suppliers in .au; this being a just-in-time manufacturing world where little to no inventory is kept at the factory, when you get strikes and such at the suppliers, Ford or GM has to idle a plant, costing them millions of dollars a day unless they can find some alternate supply.

The closest suppliers to pick up the slack for the lack of Australian suppliers would be in China, so why bother going to the expense of shipping parts from China to Australia only to ship them back to China (or the rest of mainland Asia) when you can just make the vehicles in China in the first place? Even if you take into account {the taxes} imposed on imported vehicles, it might be cheaper and certainly easier to just import from Asia to Australia than deal with the situation needed to produce cars in Koalaland.

In any case, the time to be making 'investments' for the government, if you think such things should be done, is now well past. The ones the Labor government did make were ill-targeted; they shoveled cash at Ford and (presumably) GM and it didn't do much of anything. The people they should have been shoveling cash at (again, if you think the shoveling was a good idea) were the local suppliers that produced components for Ford and GM so they could withstand the ever-escalating union wage demands despite razor-thin margins. But, they didn't and now it is far too late. There isn't anything the newly-empowered Liberals can do at this point - and Labor demonstrably couldn't do anything about it either, even when they were running the show. The suppliers are gone and they won't be coming back until the unions decide to be reasonable. Perhaps (and now probably) not even then.

I am sure the factories could be retooled for new models, but since they can't rely on local suppliers it doesn't make economic or logical sense to continue operations there. It's not just the factories that are important but the companies that make the parts that the factories use, and those are the ones that got screwed in Australia.

The *best* that could happen would be those plants assembling CKD kits from other countries at this point.

Edit:
Only 82172 vehicles produced last year, that's not alot...

To put that in perspective, the local GM plant down the road from me in Arlington (just one factory) churned out over 275,707 Tahoes/Suburbans/Yukons/Escalades last year.
 
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Well, the Holden factory is just one factory too (Elizabeth plant) but still low production numbers for a "affordable" volume car brand.
 
confirmed, from 2017 Holden will close AU operations.

HOLDEN has told the Victorian Government that it will cease operations in 2017.

The announcement will be made to the workforce later today.

More to come ...

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/holden-will-cease-operations-in-2017/story-fnii5smp-1226780690797

HOLDEN has confirmed it will cease manufacturing cars in Australia in 2017.

Victorian Premier Denis Napthine made the announcement in State Parliament this afternoon.

The announcement comes only one day after Holden chief executive Mike Devereux said that no final decision had been made about the company's future in Australia.

Dr Napthine said it was an irreversible decision made in Detroit and he was only told this afternoon.

The announcement will be made to the workforce later today.

Mr Devereux said emphatically yesterday that no decision had been made to close the company's assembly plants despite growing speculation production would stop as early as 2016.

But he also declined to outline any timetable for a decision and warned that ongoing government support was vital for the company to continue to invest in local production.

"We need a public/private partnership over the long term to be able to be relatively competitive," Mr Devereux told a Productivity Commission inquiry into the automotive industry.

The company agreed to a $275 million assistance package with the previous federal government in 2012 and was also promised more cash before the September election amid suggestions it needed as much as $500 million to commit to building two new model cars from 2016.

Following the election, the coalition reaffirmed its plans to cut $500 million from overall auto industry assistance and says no further cash is on the table for Holden.

Mr Devereux told the Productivity Commission the company was doing everything it could to cut the $3750 cost gap between building cars in Australia and building them in other countries.

"We do need to close the gap," he told the hearing.

"I don't suggest that we are asking to close that gap to zero."

He said the submission the company had made to the federal government clearly stated General Motors' threshold for doing business, but the details would remain confidential.

Holden said it generated $32.7 billion in economic activity in Australia from 2001 to 2012 and received $1.8 billion in assistance over the same period, a result it considered a good return on government investment.

More to come ...

http://www.news.com.au/national/vic...erations-in-2017/story-fnii5sms-1226780690797
 
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