Holden – Australia’s “own car”?
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On Friday 20 October 2017 the last assembled General Motors Holden passenger car rolled off the production line, bringing to an end mass production of passenger cars in Australia. Sad times for the thousands of workers directly and indirectly affected by the destruction of a whole industry, not just the Holden plants in Australia. Sad times for many families who grew up in Australia where the jingle "Football, meat pies, kangaroos and Holden cars" did reflect an identifiable way of life with many working class people buying a Holden car in the knowledge it was made here.
* No restriction on the type of vehicles General Motors Holden would make
*The Government to give General Motors first refusal on the purchase or lease of items of government-owned equipment installed in General Motors Holden plants during the war years by tax payers’ money
* Importation, free of duty and sales tax of machinery, equipment, tools unobtainable locally. Foreign exchange for this to be provided by the Government
*Travel to and from Australia by personnel required by General Motors in Australia, transport for equipment and development material from overseas to Australia to be given "suitable government priorities, and the allocation of foreign exchange for these purposes to be guaranteed" (from The Golden Holden by Arrowsmith and Zangalis 1965)
* The Government to drop its planned 10% tax on profits exported to the parent company General Motors in the USA.
From the Chifley loan in 1944 to the Button plan of the 1980s, to the neoliberal policies of governments into the 21st Century, both Labor and Liberal have danced to the multinational car makers' various tunes.
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