do you honestly think it was just a government policy maurie?

labor couldn't save ford and holden reneged on their promises to labor

did you not see ford and holden's sales slumping astronomically

once they went that just made it all the harder for toyota in an industry where size matters

I'm asking about future industry policy, not the past.

I'd like to know what the government will do to to help build trade, jobs and the standard of living. Other than leaving it to the market.

Is there ever a place for industry support?

It's a government choice to let the car industry go. Not one I necessarily wholly agree with, but it's done and dusted.

But you've conveniently overlooked my last three paragraphs:

• What overall industry policy do you suggest other than the hard-line free market?
• Do you agree with (what looks like) the State Government supporting SPC to stop all the fruit farmers in the Goulburn Valley going broke and the region becoming depressed? It's against your 'free market, anti-subsidy' principles. Obviously the National Party is wielding influence.
• Should we subsidise and support farmers? Is there a conflict of principles here?
• Will totally laissez-faire, 'dry', market-driven policies be Australia's salvation, or it's ruin?

I believe in free markets. I believe in small government.

I don't believe in helping SPC.

I believe in free markets. I believe in small government.

I don't believe in helping SPC.

Trouble is they're not always free. They're skewed.

For instance, SPC is battling against dumped imported fruit, retailed in Woolworths and Coles, that is sold for 26% below the cost of production. That's not just an opinion, it's the finding last week of the Anti-Dumping Commission. The Australian Government hasn't even applied punitive tariffs.

Ford was looking for somewhere in the world to build a new engine plant that would produce aluminium and magnesium alloy engines. The plant at Geelong, which produces older cast iron blocks, could have been upgraded, but Ford were offered $500 million assistance by the US State of Michigan to build a plant there instead. Guess which alternative they took, and who lost out?

They are the sort of 'distortions' in the free-market you are ignoring.

I believe in free markets. I believe in small government.

I don't believe in helping SPC.

I am with Joe Hockey on this, the Age of Enlightenment is over OK! Lets just get that straight.

I am with Joe Hockey on this, the Age of Enlightenment is over OK! Lets just get that straight.

Is there a free market?

Did not SPC have the Eurpeans dumping heavy subsidied food in the market? To some thats may be what the free market is all about, self interest.

What does small government mean? Fewer teachers, fire fighters, police, park rangers etc etc or less services or what I expect less regulation.

The world had just seen the greatest con job, fraud in its financial markets due to the removal of regulation that was designed to stop it from happening. As far as I am aware no more then a handful of people went to jail for this massive crime. Sure no one what silly stupid or out dated rules/laws but everyone needs strong protection from con men and other criminals. What would out country become without good environmential regulation and decisions of development was just left up to the so called free market?

If a company like SPC is unsubstainable or not a business of national importance. Then IMO it should not receive a government funding, but its hard to see how local food production is not of national importance.

When I was studing economics the funniest thing I as told by the Lecture was the theories don't actual work in the real world LOL

Is there a free market?

Did not SPC have the Eurpeans dumping heavy subsidied food in the market? To some thats may be what the free market is all about, self interest.

What does small government mean? Fewer teachers, fire fighters, police, park rangers etc etc or less services or what I expect less regulation.

The world had just seen the greatest con job, fraud in its financial markets due to the removal of regulation that was designed to stop it from happening. As far as I am aware no more then a handful of people went to jail for this massive crime. Sure no one what silly stupid or out dated rules/laws but everyone needs strong protection from con men and other criminals. What would out country become without good environmential regulation and decisions of development was just left up to the so called free market?

If a company like SPC is unsubstainable or not a business of national importance. Then IMO it should not receive a government funding, but its hard to see how local food production is not of national importance.

When I was studing economics the funniest thing I as told by the Lecture was the theories don't actual work in the real world LOL

DF dont disagree. just check what I actually said

anyway it is nice for the people of shep that a solution (for now anyway) has been found

interesting how CCA's 200mill (with 50mill needed gov subsidy) refurb is now adequate at 100mill (with 20mill gov subsidy plus conditions).

if they hadn't gone for such a high ambit in the first case it may have been settled quicker and saved some angst

i'd still like to see anti-dumping laws get some real teeth instead of moving at glacial speed (pre global warming that is)

What the rightist idealogues don't understand about agriculture, indeed many industries, is the need to assist transformation to help make them more competitive. They read too much from Andrew Bolt, the IPA and the Productivity Commission and think money is for 'bail-outs' to keep doing what farmers have always done.

They should get out around farmers, go to field days and start watching programs like Landline to see where farming is headed, the terrific innovations that are taking place and how government assistance can really help. I've been working in the dairying industry for 25 years. A friend farms 200ha of fresh vegetables near where I live. To just treat these industries in a 'sink or swim' fashion in the current uneven market and economic circumstances would be disastrous.

I have no doubt that without government help, CCA would have just closed its SPC division as a lost cause and walked away. It would have led to huge economic implications for the Goulburn Valley and a depression in the area. All for $25 million.

SPC is basically a traditional cannery (with some updating for plastic containers). What modern food processing needs is the capability to process and market fruit in a more fresh manner, using techniques such as plastic snack packs and vacuum sealing. The assistance asked for was to transition and modernise these lines, not just as a 'bail-out' to retain existing inefficient means of production.

BTW, China currently puts a 20% tariff on fruit and fruit products imported from Australia. We put a zero tariff on fruit imported from China.

Edited February 17, 201411 yr by mauriesy

Australia has the highest rate of budgetary assistance to the automotive industry at $US 1885 per vehicle, with the next closest Sweden at $297 per vehicle. In point of fact, the figure for the US came in at only $166 per vehicle and Germany at $206 per vehicle.

^ all western countries ^, being exploited, by the former exploited I guess, the east.

brilliant outsourcing that.

What the rightist idealogues don't understand about agriculture, indeed many industries, is the need to assist transformation to help make them more competitive. They read too much from Andrew Bolt, the IPA and the Productivity Commission and think money is for 'bail-outs' to keep doing what farmers have always done.

They should get out around farmers, go to field days and start watching programs like Landline to see where farming is headed, the terrific innovations that are taking place and how government assistance can really help. I've been working in the dairying industry for 25 years. A friend farms 200ha of fresh vegetables near where I live. To just treat these industries in a 'sink or swim' fashion in the current uneven market and economic circumstances would be disastrous.

I have no doubt that without government help, CCA would have just closed its SPC division as a lost cause and walked away. It would have led to huge economic implications for the Goulburn Valley and a depression in the area. All for $25 million.

SPC is basically a traditional cannery (with some updating for plastic containers). What modern food processing needs is the capability to process and market fruit in a more fresh manner, using techniques such as plastic snack packs and vacuum sealing. The assistance asked for was to transition and modernise these lines, not just as a 'bail-out' to retain existing inefficient means of production.

BTW, China currently puts a 20% tariff on fruit and fruit products imported from Australia. We put a zero tariff on fruit imported from China.

Interesting reading Maurie and I genuinely mean that.

Off the top of my head, I'm a little conflicted over this. I can see that CCA is a huge company and I wonder why they couldn't just fit the bill for 25 million (I see your point though that business will go where government money is). I also worry that Australia will become like the UK and the US where they pretty much end up making nothing except financial 'products' or have workers mostly in the hospitality areas.

Would like to educate myself more on this topic.

cap·i·tal·ism [kap-i-tl-iz-uhm] Show IPA

noun

an economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or corporations, especially as contrasted to cooperatively or state-owned means of wealth.

Looks Australian to me

about as Australian as haggis

where are they Now? now that u.n.c.l.e. tony & his capitalist mates have shown the door, thru lack of interest in our Own manufacturing sector, & to the Holden car.

Well it seems that toyota, the company that uncle tony was talking up; says they to will walk out the door, now they don't have to compete with locally built cars.

Australia open for business NOT !!! Up for sale, it is, to the cheapest bidders.

The danger of Government Give Aways , sorry I mean Subsidies, is that they will focus on their own self interest and mates.

a country brown & wide like ours needs transport. we need cars.

We need to keep the structures in-place, so we can return to rebuilding our own vehicles.

IF the infrastructure is torn down & scrapped from the Holden & Ford factories, we will NEVER be able to pickup the pieces. The retooling & creating the production line will be too costly to restart that production line in 10 years time.

We Need a moratorium on selling/destroying the car plants facilities of Holden & Ford; even if they stay unoccupied & still for 10 years. We must ensure they remain in an operative condition for later.

Edited March 21, 201510 yr by dee-luded

On 4/2/2014 at 7:41 AM, DemonFrog said:

Sorry DL but I have no sympathy for Arnotts as they did the same thing to our local biscuit maker (Mills & Ware). Purchased the business and then closed it down.

But we do need our Vegemite back LOL

 

So its really the stockmarkets fault,  all this greed,  & selling out of our own people.   Arnotts or Vegemite,  or going offshore with all our manufacturing giving away our it & engineeering expertise for nothing,  & ending up having it come back to bite us all.  Coming back subsidised by the Chinese government,  so as to undermine our strong industries & grind them back into our own dirt,  so the Chinese can have a monopoly once our strong industries are all smashed apart.