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Auto sector gets another bleak warning

GREG KEENAN

From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

Latest comment posted at 2:41 PM EDT 30/04/08

Study predicts Canadian industry will continue to lose ground as Mexican production ramps up ...Read the full article

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  1. PETER T from Toronto, Canada writes: Urgh..Come on..If you look at those low-end (fuel efficient) cars that those car manufacturer's are selling, they are made in Mexico already..With not much labour regulations in force and low wages continues in Mexico, Mexico would be like China (supplies North America would low cost goods includes TV, cars..) and more on that was the Free Trade Agreement that kills us all..Neither US and Canada wont be able to compete with Mexico on cost cutting...Probably a BIG 3 Assembly get paid almost $ 40 here with benefits would be paid around $ 4 with no benefits in Mexico...
  2. Duncan Munro from Canada writes:
    The biggest problem is that the big 3 were allowed to build these gas guzzler monsters in the 1st place, and much the production of these vehicles was centred in Canada. Now the big 3 can't give them away. We need a crash program to develop highly fuel efficient, affordable cars, that are built in Canada. The North American market is screaming for fuel efficiency, but the Big3 just won't respond. Governments at the Federal and Provincial level have to step in and coordinate concerted policy to correct this situation.
  3. Jay Singh from Canada writes: Um how about another Camaro.
  4. the vegan ninja from Canada writes: The GM trucks in question are gas guzzling dinosaurs. How can anyone be surprised, other than those with their heads firmily in the sand?
  5. D W from Halifax, Canada writes: Gas guzzling dinosaurs....typical rhetoric from the newly enlightened. You people are really sad.

    Where have all the leaders gone? Buzz is concerned only about himself and his position. The union workers deserve better than limited leadership like him leading them down an ever bleaker road. It isn't too late for someone to save the unions from themselves. The days of $100,000 salaries for production line work are over. Places like China and Mexico have the capital in place, and their workers are progressing fast, making the productivity gap very small indeed.

    Instead of you Utopian Neanderthals complaining that its the domestic management that is to blame (they have their part), try to understand, it's about the payroll...it needs to be lower, considerably lower. If the current workers aren't willing to make the concessions, move aside and let the younger generation compete in the world.

    I know that's not the utopia many of you dream of....it's merely reality.
  6. DON BARTA from Canada writes: When you start getting all your parts from the lowest bidder and put costs above quality - you should not be suprised when your customers go elsewhere.

    When employees get a discount and they still go elsewhere, you got a problem...........
  7. George Bishop from Fergus, Ontario, Canada writes: On the American URL "thetruthaboutcars.com" they are saying that these two truck vehicles that are built in Oshawa and also in the USA are two of the largest profit makers for General Motors! and they are not selling due to the Mortgage mess in the USA as well as the high price of Fuel, also I think that the USA is right now in depression, something that most USA people reject!
  8. Lewis Armstrong from Canada writes:

    “Viewed in a global or regional context, Canada's competitive position continues to decline,” the report says. “In fact, the long-term viability of the Canadian automotive industry is in question.”

    -------------
    Ontario is no longer an attractive place to invest. We have very high corporate taxes-we need the revenue to pay handsomely government employees such as Ontario Hydro, TTC, education, CUPE etc. We have a strike-minded culture, and an education system which indoctrinates children to think in liberal terms and to feel entitled- with a virtual monopoly on education, parents have few options.
  9. Dan Chadwick from montreal, Canada writes: The Canadian Automotive Partnership Council is seeking government aid in order to prop up the automobile industry. I'm not at all in favour of my tax dollars going to support industries that are responsible for the depletion of the earth’s nature resources to make products that are major contributors to the degradation of our planet. Consider for an instant the amount of resources used to support the usage of the automobile. Highways, fuel, parking lots, tires, and insurance, just to name a few of the elements related to an industry that is causing major harm to our life support systems.
    Any organization that says it is working to eliminate the mass utilization of the automobile will get my support, financially and morally.
  10. Ray Crawford from toronto, Canada writes: I drove a 1999 three-cylinder Chev Geo Metro for about 5 years; average highway mileage was about 55 miles to the gallon. I started to feel guilty that I wasn't doing enough for global warming, so in 1995 I bought a new GMC gas guzzler truck; average mileage: 25 mpg.

    Mr. Basil "Buzz" Hargrove is always mouthing off that the CAW supports "progressive" social causes like the environment. Well, Mr. Basil Buzz, the elimination of 80, 000 Sierra and Silverado gas-guzzling pickups from production this year with the loss of thousands of auto jobs must make you a happy man. Now stand up, pally, and demand the scrapping of the equally gaz-guzzling muscle car, the Camaro. I couldn't care less about all these nutbar left-wing, crypto-fascist causes. Nobody, but nobody is going to tell me what to buy , what to drive or even what to think especially some hillbilly from Bath, New Brunswick ( my mother's home town).
  11. Cynicus Stevenski from Canada writes: Again as I said a few days ago " What part of jobs G-O-N-E does the union leadership not understand?"
  12. the vegan ninja from Canada writes: How come some people don't have any original thoughts, and can only get excited from the comments of others? Never mind the trucks, looks like some of them are dinosaurs too. I suggest to them: get a bike, or perhaps more suitably, a trike!
  13. A reader from Canada writes: I , for one, will not buy any vehicle made in Mexico as I don't feel the quality and reliability is there. For the same reasons, I will not knowingly buy a product made in China. Many times you have to pay considerably more for the product; however, in the long run because of durability, quality and reliability it is cheaper.
  14. Don Wells from Calgary, Canada writes: Most of these laid off workers get 2 years of about 65% of their gross pay according to the local union leader--maybe these workers should use the opportunity to get trained to do something else--even move to Alberta--We would be happy to have them!
  15. SN Dream from Canada writes: It's a typical example of supply and demand, the union is like a monopoly in the supply of labor, when they insist wages to be unrealistically high (Price Floor) during a time when the demand of labour is particular low (No one is buying GM's car), it will create a unemployment. If they want to reserve the problem, stop asking for ridiculous wages.

    Buzz should go back to high school and take some economic course, this is really basic stuff.

    At the end of the day, should Ontario be investing in domestic company to nurture more companies like RIM or invest in foreign company like GM so they will keep the factory here for a few years longer?? The answer is really obvious.
  16. Winston Churchill from London, Canada writes: Just bought a car yesterday. The old one died after nine years of faithful service. It was an Acura, built in Brantford. I've always tried to buy 'Canadian', since ultimately the guys who make those cars pay my salary. The new one is a Honda built in Japan. Why buy Japanese? I was looking for fuel efficiency, first and foremost. For whatever reason, cars built locally are all guzzlers, comparatively. Its pretty simple. If our plants are turning out Ford trucks, Grand Marquis and Chrysler 300s, we're going to suffer (especially if the projections regarding fuel costs are even close to true). Best 'deals' in used cars are Ford 500s (go figure), but who would want one? I just can't fathom why the Big Three keep turning out the same old chyt, things being as they are. Mind boggles to think of hybrid technology being strapped onto a Escalade, so that it can improve fuel efficiency by 13%. Wow! It will get 12 as opposed to 10 mpg, and perhaps some fuels will continue to buy it, confident that its not all that bad because its a hybrid. I don't blame the guys who make the cars. I don't care how much they make -- labour is about 8% of the cost of a new car. I don't blame unions. I wish everybody could make 80k a year. I blame management for running what use to be one of the motors of N. American prosperity into the ground. Surely what they make in Mexico can also be made here, better.
  17. harry carnie from Northern,B.C, Canada writes: Domestic...Imported..quality ..or crap.....if our economy does not have the wages for people to purchase the cars/trucks........it will really not matter a hell of a lot in the long haul will it?

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