[FormulaFG]

Unfortunately Australia never owned its auto industry.

All the manufacturers here were foreign owned. It makes complete sense that they would look after jobs in their respective motherlands before looking after our jobs, and why good ideas and products we came up with here were never given proper traction and funding for export.

I've often thought Holden's birth doomed it from the start. The idea behind Holden was 100% correct, but the federal government should have set up an Australian manufacturer from scratch. It should have been made very clear to GM or any other manufacturer if they wanted to be involved they would be paid for their help but would NOT have any ownership of the business.

Had this happened it would have stayed in Australian hands. Would have been able to sell cars to any country in the world that wanted to buy them, without having to get "permission" from another country and we may still have a productive auto industry today.