From the ABC:
Ford was due to close its Broadmeadows and Geelong factories as early as 2016.
But the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union said it feared Ford could pull out before then if the Federal Government made any changes to the Automotive Transition Scheme.
“It’s really the uncertainty being created by the lack of information from the Federal Government about the support for the industry to allow it to work itself out until those dates,” AWU spokesman Dave Smith said.
“I really fear that they’ll just slash and burn in the budget. The Automotive Transformation Scheme, if they touch that, if they reduce the amount of money available to the industry from that scheme, then it will close early.”
Earlier on Saturday, local Labor MP John Eren accused the Victorian Government of not doing enough to ensure Ford sticks to its 2016 timeline.
“You have a federal Liberal government that doesn’t care about blue-collar workers and you have a state government that is lazy and doesn’t do their work so I really, really fear for those workers,” he said.
Manufacturing Minister David Hodgett said Ford was not planning on pulling out early and the Opposition and the union were playing politics with the issue.
“They’ve given every indication they’ll be here to the end,” he said.
“Of course this is dependent on their production. They build for demand. If sales figures are down, of course they’re going to wind back production.
“But whenever the Premier and I go down to Ford, they all say they want to continue to make cars right to the end.”
This looks like more pre-budget posturing. This morning from AAP:
Ford has hosed down speculation it will pull-out of Australia earlier than expected, saying it’s on track with its plan to continue to make cars here until 2016.
A union official said Ford had not been as clear on how long it intended to stay as Toyota and Holden had, according to a News Ltd report.
