Holden means a shaky deal to Elizabeth
Last week Holden announced that it would sack 1400 workers from its Elizabeth factory.
Most of these come from the third shift that was added a couple of years ago. I remember seeing that story on TV a while back, and a newly recruited 18 year old said that he wouldn't mind if he worked there for his whole life.
Sorry.
Positions at Holden are good things to have in a place like Elizabeth that is otherwise pretty crappy. They are full time, quite highly paid and have all sorts of conditions, allowances and god knows what else that have been won by decades of beligerant industrial action. Next to Opel employees in Germany (Who have also had some quite alarming cutbacks), the Elizabeth workforce is said to be the most expensive GM workforce in the world.
This announcement is obviously quite horrible for the 1400, who have played all the games and done all that was asked of them while they were there only to be sent packing. On the other hand it is logically untenable to keep employing people to build large cars that will sit unsold due to rising fuel prices.
As this partcular oil crisis was caused by fairly predictable Chinese demand, not by arabs and Americans taking turns in being cunts, I would say that whoever is doing the forecasting at Holden needs to be given the boot as well.
Either way, our generation hit the workforce after the mass layoffs and restructuring that tore the guts out of the manufacturing industry in the '80s. Some of the people laid off then were told twenty years prior that they would have jobs for life and they had reason to believe it. They (Quite justifiably) felt betrayed.
Nobody today should believe that they will be working in the same place for their whole career. While even a job in a precarious vehicle manufacturing sector is a good thing to have in the short term, setting anchor there is not a wise thing to do. Holden makes this easy, as very little is learned there that is transferable outside of a heavily unionised mass production environment.
Self reliance is a great thing to have in theory, but very few people encourage this in practice.
Most of these come from the third shift that was added a couple of years ago. I remember seeing that story on TV a while back, and a newly recruited 18 year old said that he wouldn't mind if he worked there for his whole life.
Sorry.
Positions at Holden are good things to have in a place like Elizabeth that is otherwise pretty crappy. They are full time, quite highly paid and have all sorts of conditions, allowances and god knows what else that have been won by decades of beligerant industrial action. Next to Opel employees in Germany (Who have also had some quite alarming cutbacks), the Elizabeth workforce is said to be the most expensive GM workforce in the world.
This announcement is obviously quite horrible for the 1400, who have played all the games and done all that was asked of them while they were there only to be sent packing. On the other hand it is logically untenable to keep employing people to build large cars that will sit unsold due to rising fuel prices.
As this partcular oil crisis was caused by fairly predictable Chinese demand, not by arabs and Americans taking turns in being cunts, I would say that whoever is doing the forecasting at Holden needs to be given the boot as well.
Either way, our generation hit the workforce after the mass layoffs and restructuring that tore the guts out of the manufacturing industry in the '80s. Some of the people laid off then were told twenty years prior that they would have jobs for life and they had reason to believe it. They (Quite justifiably) felt betrayed.
Nobody today should believe that they will be working in the same place for their whole career. While even a job in a precarious vehicle manufacturing sector is a good thing to have in the short term, setting anchor there is not a wise thing to do. Holden makes this easy, as very little is learned there that is transferable outside of a heavily unionised mass production environment.
Self reliance is a great thing to have in theory, but very few people encourage this in practice.
posted by Mr Schrempp @ 12:33 pm
2 Comments:
At 10:40 pm,
Unknown said…
You are right mate.
There is nothing wrong with well paid, well supported manufacturing jobs in the western world. The problem is, times have changed and no body told the uneducated, who are probably the types of people recently told that they were no longer required at GMH.
The finger of blame will fall on the government, capitalism, the managers, the markets, the unions and anyone else apart from the workers, who are generally labelled the innocents. And they are innocent, they didn’t know this was coming. Blame should fall on everyone. If you were dumb enough to walk into a car manufacturing job in Australia, expecting 1950s style job protection, then you are an idiot. If you didn’t tell potential workers that their jobs are not secure, then you are greedy. If you didn’t tell the people who voted for you that manufacturing, especially of the automobile, will continue its exodus from Australia, then you are politically mischievous. And if you didn’t tell your supporters that the world is a different place, then you are protecting number one.
Many people are at fault here but only a few lost their jobs, if only they knew better.
At 12:47 am,
Mr Schrempp said…
As I said, Holden makes it very easy to set anchor. We've done job applications for people going to work for Holden, and we have very often had to dumb them down so they didn't look over qualified.
Holden trains them up to do jobs in the plant and before too long, they've got skills that are only useful to Holden. This kind of assymetrical dependance suits them.
That's OK if you want to spend a little while there and then go get a degree or trade or whatever. (Several members of my family have done this).
It's a bit of a problem when you get used to the good pay and commit yourself to car payments, kids, mortgages and what not. With that kind of continuous financial drain, it's really not possible to just walk away and live the student life for a little while.
More will have to face these kinds of decisions though, as Daewoo is becoming GM's manufacturing powerhouse in the Asia Pacific and isn't likely to see Australian production in it's immediate future.
For now, 4300 will remain at Holden. It would be a good idea for them to work out what they want from Holden, get it, and get out at a time of their chosing.
Post a Comment
<< Home