With Australian automotive manufacturing to cease by next year, companies and workers need to find new things to do. That’s why the Victorian Government’s $46.5 million Automotive Transition plan is so welcome.

The plan will help automotive design, engineering and manufacturing workers retrain, and assist automotive businesses to find new markets.

With 35,000 jobs expected to go when Ford, GM Holden and Toyota close their local plants, the plan will attempt to offset those losses. Millions of dollars of manufacturing equipment will be re-purposed rather than lost.

Automotive technologies can be applied in other fields, such as trucks, buses, trams, trains, military vehicles, agriculture, construction, aircraft, medical and scientific equipment.

Component manufacturing for overseas markets, which some companies are already doing, is  another potential re-use of resources.  Likewise for local aftermarket parts and accessories.