Are We Like Australia Now

Are we going to have any more automobiles made in Canada as time marches on?

What if we do not? If you did not know, the Automobile Industry in Australia closed down after a hundred years in 2017 as business there got worse. Might that happen in Canada as well, especially in our area?

Obviously, my comment is made in the context of the closing down of the GM plant in Oshawa that just happened. However, as far as this region is concerned, will we still have the Chrysler plant in the future producing vehicles and with a good number of employees as well?

Obviously, it is still too early for me to make profound comments about what is going to happen. What I did find somewhat surprising is that both the Prime Minister and the Premier of Ontario have taken the position that it is all over and that the Oshawa plant will not be open again. They do not seem as if they are going to oppose anything or even can do so successfully:

“both federal and provincial governments are signalling there's little they can do now to save a key component of the company's Canadian operations as executives pursue a global shakeup in response to slumping auto sales.

"I talked to the president of GM last night. The first thing I said is, 'What can we do? What do we have to do?'" Ontario Premier Doug Ford told reporters this morning. "And he said, 'The ship has already left the dock.'" (John Paul Tasker , CBC News, Nov 26, 2018) 

I must admit that I think that this will hurt the Federal Liberals politically considering that their election is going to be coming up in the fall next year, or perhaps even earlier if they decide to call the election before then. With all the talk of not buying certain vehicles now that certain people are proposing online, it would seem to me that this will hurt the Government in the next election. After all, remember that there are thousands of people outside of the auto companies who work to build parts to the cars as well. Are they all going to lose their jobs too? Just think of the many people who will be out of work very quickly. Has anybody picked a new place for them to be employed?

There is not very much more that I can say right now since everything is just starting. We will have to see if the Senior Government people will wake up and change their position before it hurts them politically.

For those of us who live in the Windsor area, we better start seeing what may happen to Chrysler and how it may impact us. Our local Government people better wake up and start looking aggressively at how they can diversify our economy here so that more people will have jobs to find in the event that the automobile industry closes down here even more than it has to date.