The sad dismantling of General Motors’ Holden manufacturing operations continues with another 400 engineers expected to lose their jobs before Christmas. While the news isn’t particularly shocking, cutting jobs prior to the holiday season is discouraging.
With Holden’s manufacturing closure of 2017 approaching, the union representing the engineering workers confirmed on a Drive’s story that these 400 jobs will be eliminated. Another 200 are also expected to be eliminated before the end of next year.
These engineers are currently working on revamping the VF Commodore, a strong seller since it was launched mid-2013 and giving the Holden Cruze one more update. Once these products are done, the engineers will be laid off.
Ultimately, the union representing the workers says that when Holden reverts to an “import-only” status, the company will retain only around 100 engineers. These engineers will used in their global design center.
The saddest part of this story is the state of the Australian automotive industry. The ex-Holden engineers face a job market where their specialized talents don’t apply. Many of these engineers will have to look overseas for similar work and probably will have to uproot their families to do so.
For its part Holden says it is doing everything it can to make it a smooth transition.
Comments
Sad is the operative word in this text. Many Aussies feel we have been delt a blow by GM and by our foolish government.
Retribution is a common word these days and we’ll see some of that at the next federal election. As for the greedy and missmanaged GM … good luck with your sales. Holden will no longer be an Aussie car … just a name that we used to support.
GM is only in business to make money for share holders, this is cold but the truth for any publicly held company.
The one you need to be upset with is the government for not providing a profitable environment.
But also you have to factor in you are a very small market and in todays world it is getting harder and harder to afford to be in small markets with specialized product.
You may hate GM but they are not the only ones leaving.
I do feel for all the workers as with the business climate it will be difficult to fine work else where unless you go into some tough jobs no one else wants.
I am familiar with one source that has suggested the number of engineers out of these 400 that will redeployed to elsewhere in GM will be in the single digits. If this is true then it is a shame not only for them and our country but also for GM. Either GM has no place for them or the majority have no desire to move to Detroit from Melbourne or work for GM any more.
Ford saw the value in keeping its engineering workforce here (over 1100 engineers and designers will be retained after 2016) whereas GM has decided to let all that talent and experience go. These guys are probably going to go work for GM’s competitors or retrain and find jobs elsewhere. If I was in GM’s shoes I would have found a way to keep the bulk of the engineering workforce to avoid this from happening.
I’m not all that familiar with engineering but I imagine that some maybe able to do some training to convert to a different field. For example someone who specialises in control systems or electrical type engineering maybe able to retrain from working in the automotive field to something similar in urban rail. I know there is a reasonable demand out there in the growing and advancing urban rail systems in Australia’s cities for engineers so that may be a possibility.
I’m glad I’m not in there shoes but I wish them the best. They have done Holden fans proud with the work they have done.