Kevin Rudd calls for Australian car manufacturing revival

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd has called for Australian car manufacturing to be restarted, calling it “a sovereign capability we now sorely lack” and the closure of the local industry a “shortsighted act of vandalism”.

In an address to the National Press Club of Australia in Canberra, Mr Rudd, who was prime minister from 2007 to 2010 and again in 2013, presented a speech entitled The Complacent Country: Navigating Australia’s future in an uncertain world.

The former prime minister and this nation's ambassador to the US until his term was cut short in March 2026 said Australia had drifted from the comfort of the myth of the ‘Lucky Country’ to now be the ‘Complacent Country’.

“The global strategic, economic and technological forces now bearing down on this nation are of an order of magnitude, severity and complexity that is unprecedented in our postwar history,” Mr Rudd began.

While speaking about China, artificial intelligence (AI) and climate change, Mr Rudd said reinvigorating Australia’s former car-making capability should be part of addressing the challenges the country faces.

“Of all the shortsighted acts of economic vandalism in recent decades, the close of our industry by the Abbott-Hockey government stands apart,” Mr Rudd said.

“Australia under my government had one of the most modest industry subsidies in the auto world, but politics triumphed, sacrificing tens of thousands of jobs, tearing the bleeding heart out of Australia’s engineering and manufacturing base, and rendering us 100 per cent dependent on auto imports.

“Now the 3D printing and EV [electric vehicle] revolutions mean we can rebuild an Australian auto sector and repair this vital vulnerability in our national security.”

While praising the current federal government’s efforts on broader issues, Mr Rudd said governments from both sides of politics could not overcome such forces on their own and must work with industries to achieve growth.

AI, he said, presents Australia with “a unique opportunity to become an international powerhouse”.

“I say this because of the sheer magnitude of inbound investment that stands ready to come here – right across the AI stack – based on American assessments of our ability to use world-class chips to deliver top-quality AI services across the Asia-Pacific.”

Support for reviving the local car industry from Mr Rudd, who led the Australian Labor Party, follows similar comments from Liberal Party member Andrew Hastie, the current shadow minister for industry and sovereign capability.

Earlier this year, Mr Hastie said on social media: “Australia is weaker without a strong, vibrant, complex and advanced manufacturing capability.

“Every strategic sector relies on manufacturing, from defence, mining, energy, infrastructure, agriculture, health and space.

“Advanced manufacturing is not about the end product, like cars, even if our heart does beat for a Holden Torana. It’s about ambition, and that’s why we feel a sense of sadness when a factory closes – it’s like we’re less ambitious as a people.”

Similarly, Bernie Quinn, the head of local engineering firm Premcar, which turns 30 years old today and has customers including Mitsubishi, Nissan and Chery, told CarExpert in 2025 the local auto industry could be revived.

“We’re doing it through secondary manufacturing at the moment, but this could be expanded to build cars in Australia for Australians,” Mr Quinn said.

“It wouldn’t be easy, but is it possible? A hundred per cent, yes. Would it be successful? 110 per cent. With the right attitude and the right amount of commitment it could be very, very successful.”

The automotive manufacturing sector stopped producing cars from the ground up after factories operated by Ford, Toyota and Holden, all foreign-owned companies, closed by the end of 2017.

Ford began assembling vehicles in Australia in 1925, but the local auto industry flourished after the end of World War II in 1945. The first Holden was produced in November 1948, local production of the Ford Falcon started in 1960, and Toyota vehicles were first assembled in Port Melbourne in 1963, marking one of the brand’s earliest production operations outside its native Japan.

Import tariffs helped vehicles from Volkswagen, Renault, Citroen, Volvo, Leyland – including Mini – and Chrysler to be assembled here, as well as Datsun models and locally developed Mitsubishis, including the Australian-specific Magna sedan and wagon launched in 1985.

In 2013, Ford announced it would close its local manufacturing facilities at Geelong and Broadmeadows in Victoria by the end of 2016, and the latter site is now set to host a data centre owned by a Singapore-based organisation.

Toyota and Holden followed a year later, winding up their remaining plants in Victoria and South Australia, respectively, in 2017.

This saw the Holden brand rely solely on imports for the first time in its history, yet sales dwindled and its owner, General Motors (GM) in the US, axed the brand completely in 2020.

Ford remains the biggest employer of automotive designers and engineers in Australia, despite downsizing its vehicle development staff headcount since 2016. The US company maintains its design centre at Broadmeadows and its You Yangs proving ground near Geelong, where the current Ranger and Everest models were developed before being sold in more than 180 countries.

Nissan Australia also continues to operate a casting plant at Dandenong in Melbourne’s southeast, making components for global models across the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance, including electric vehicles such as the Nissan Leaf, as well as parts for the Navara and Patrol.

MORE: Ford Ranger and Everest development to remain in Australia