AAAA welcomes auto jobs strategies

With Ford, Holden and Toyota closing their Australian factories by 2017, the country's automotive design, engineering and manufacturing skills looked lost forever.

However, the three manufacturers have said they will maintain a design and engineering presence in Australia, and more recently, the Federal and Victorian Governments have announced their respective plans to transition the Australian automotive workforce into other areas once the manufacturers close their doors.

Victoria's Government announced its $45.6 million Automotive Transition Plan, which has been designed to help automotive businesses and their workers migrate to new markets as well as retraining the workforce for sustainable jobs.

Stuart Charity, Executive Director of the Australian Automotive Aftermarket Association (AAAA), expressed his delight with the Victorian Government's initiative.

"It would be tragic to lose Victoria's high technology automotive manufacturing capability," he said.

"The Automotive Transition Plan will help keep skilled jobs and precision production processes alive in this State."

Charity also said that the AAAA is urging the Federal and State Governments to focus attention on the need for policy that promotes innovation and commercialisation of new products and growth in those parts of the automotive industry that will remain after 2017.

Furthermore, the AAAA will be working closely to help the Victorian Government implement its plan.

"This [program] will be a great asset," said Charity.

"The AAAA looks forward to working closely with the Victorian Government to implement its Automotive Transition Plan."

In addition to the Victorian State Government's initiative to push the Victorian automotive workforce into more sustainable jobs post-2017, the Australian Federal Government recently announced its National Innovation & Science Agenda (NISA) initiative.

In terms of the automotive sector, the AAAA hopes that the NISA initiative will help to keep the Australian automotive manufacturing sector alive after local manufacturing ceases, through Incubator Support and Innovations Connections Programs.

The AAAA's embrace of the new government initiatives marks a thawing in the relationship between the aftermarket association and the government, following the outcry raised after the Productivity Commission presented its findings from a review of the automotive industry.

Charity said that the AAAA has been in talks with Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science, Christopher Pyne, to discuss several proposals including an Automotive Innovation Hub that will not only facilitate research and development, but more importantly, help create more jobs.

"One of [the] AAAA visions is a purpose built and professionally managed Automotive Innovation Hub to facilitate research and product development in the sector," Charity said.

"The Automotive Innovation Hub would act as an incubator providing technical skills and equipment required to help automotive businesses get their product concepts off the drawing board and into the market."

"The Special Equipment Market Association [SEMA] of the USA has such a facility... It has helped bring many bright ideas successfully to the market, which in turn creates new jobs," he added.

Charity also outlined that there is significant potential for Australia's automotive aftermarket sector to be leveraged to help maintain employment and investment in both OEM component and aftermarket parts and accessories manufacturing, with huge export growth potential for these market segments.
Picture courtesy of CoolDrive