5AA

01 Feb 2016 Transcipt

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

Interivew - 5AA - Mornings
1 February 2016

SUBJECTS: Automotive investment in South Australia and Victoria;

Leon Byner: Big subject for SA of course is jobs, employment; prosperity. Let’s talk to the Industry Minister Chris Pyne. Chris thanks for being available.

Christopher Pyne: Good morning Leon. It’s nice to be with you.

Leon Byner: Now, a Senate committee report from December of last year, as I understand it, recommended some changing of the criteria for this industry transformation scheme, arguing that currently it’s too narrow. Are you going to implement those changes?

Christopher Pyne: No, that’s not our intention. Let me explain the Automotive Transformation Scheme to your listeners, Leon. It was a scheme initiated by the Howard Government to help transform the car makers, the four- in those days four car makers - into a modern, export oriented industry that obviously employed thousands of Australians, particularly South Australians and Victorians. And it continues right through to 2021-22, still providing funds for car makers and component manufacturers as long as there is a car maker here who is able to access the scheme, because that’s what the legislation says.

In addition to that, we’ve done things since the closure of Holden- the announcement of the closure of Holden, which you’d know about. Things like the Automotive Diversification Programme – I announced some grants about that only a couple of weeks ago – the Next Generation Manufacturing Investment Programme, and I announced another $30 million round of grants about last Friday.

So the Automotive Transformation Scheme is just one of a number of different responses from federal and state governments to the jobs issue that we face here in South Australia, and I’m very happy if we can get another car manufacturer to set up here that’ll continue to support them.

Leon Byner: Well now, on that subject, you’ve got Guido Dumarey who is going to see you, I suspect, in the next day or two.

Christopher Pyne: Tomorrow.

Leon Byner: Yeah, and of course the lower dollar makes it much better for any export situation, doesn’t it? Because …

Christopher Pyne: I hope so, yeah.

Leon Byner: Yeah, yeah. So, I don’t want to give people false hope, and I know you don’t, but obviously this fund is going to have some bearing on what comes of this. What are you hoping for?

Christopher Pyne: Well, I’m hopeful, and I agree it would be wrong to raise peoples’ expectations to the extent where they grieve a second time for the loss of a car maker in South Australia. But I’m hopeful that Guido Dumarey and his Punch Corporation can successfully negotiate with General Motors in Detroit, which is out of our hands to an extent. But I have spoken to the chief executives here in South Australia, and happy to continue to do so at General Motors to encourage them to look in a positive way upon this proposal.

If we can get them to take over the Holden plant they will be able to access the Automotive Transformation Scheme, as long as they produce 30,000 units a year, and that’s what Guido tells me they want to do, and of course that’s good news. He also has a plan to try and bring all the component manufacturers that would help to make this business viable to Northern Adelaide, so it could end up being an actually very significant economic boost to our state, which obviously I would very much like as well. So I will keep the Automotive Transformation Scheme open, because if there is a car manufacturer in Australia they’ll be able to access it, and I want them to be able to.

Leon Byner: So basically you don’t like the Senate committee recommendations because why?

Christopher Pyne: Well, because they are just more ways that the Senate, which is not the Government of Australia, are trying to spend the Australian taxpayer’s money in ways that they think will make themselves popular with their particular interest groups. What I’m trying to do, as the Minister for Industry, is use things like the Next Generation Manufacturing Industry Programme; the Automotive Diversification Programme; the South Australia and Victoria Industry Growth Fund. We are doing all the things that the Senate inquiry talked about but in a much bigger way, in a much more successful way, because we’re the Government of Australia and we get to make those decisions about how to help South Australians. In this case, it is very much my interest as a South Australian member.

Leon Byner: So, knowing that the Punch Corporation will want access to the fund, so what does it rest on for him to be able to do it?

Christopher Pyne: Yeah, good question. Well, it rests on General Motors agreeing to sell or lease to him – but I assume sell, I doubt a lease would satisfy him – the Holden plant. Now, he’s done it at Strasbourg in Europe, he took over an ailing General Motors plant, saved the jobs, turned it around, and it is supplying General Motors. It’s supplying General Motors internationally and other automotive manufacturers. He should be able to do that here, but it requires General Motors to agree. I would assume that would mean that General Motors wouldn’t want him to be competing with them in their market, and he’d want to be producing things that they would probably not otherwise produce.

Now, he says that’s possible because it’s a different platform at Holden in Elizabeth than it is elsewhere in the world, and therefore he’d be producing vehicles that General Motors either aren’t producing or don’t want to produce. Of course, the other thing, Leon, which is very important is that General Motors will have to rehabilitate that site when they leave it, which will cost them a great deal of money. So there could well be a reason for them to deal with Mr- with the Punch Corporation, because he might well take over that potential cost for them. So I’m hopeful, and I’m working hard to make this happen, and Mr Dumarey is meeting Malcolm Turnbull as well in Canberra this week, so we’re leaving no stone unturned.

Leon Byner: All right. When do you think we’ll know?

Christopher Pyne: Well, Mr Dumarey has set mid-this-year as the deadline for this to be finalised.

Leon Byner: All right. Chris, thanks for joining us, and you’ll keep us in the loop won’t you?

Christopher Pyne: Pleasure, Leon. I’d love to.

Leon Byner: Good on you. That’s the Industry Minister Chris Pyne, just explaining the situation with the Punch Corporation. And as I told you, they’re in town – as in in Canberra – in the next day or two, and we’ll- Mr Dumarey is not talking to the media, understandably, but we’ve got people pretty close to him and we’ll be able to give you a blow by blow on what’s going on.

[ends]