[jpd80]

Mulally back in 2012 said no more one off vehicles for one off countries. He was so sick of Aussie journalists pestering him about FOA’s manufacturing future that he just refused to discuss it. It didn’t matter if Falcon and Territory were profitable or not, no money would ever again be invested in a new product cycle when Ford could get a better return elsewhere.

I don’t exactly know what Holden and GM were thinking but it looks like things changed after the election when the Liberals claimed they had a mandate to stop throwing money at the local industry, they listened too much to the ultra right wing rhetoric instead of just looking at balanced support, we give you something, what’s the return to the taxpayers. The local business activity generated, employment and tax paid from that was never fully considered.

In saying that, I suspect that Ford had quietly off-shored most of its suppliers by 2012, in complete contrast to Holden, zeta was very much home spun on local Aussie supplies set up as a cottage industry. All so sad to see can do attitude dismissed so easily by the brown shirts.