Verge wrote on Jul 23
rd, 2012 at 11:36am:
Prevailing wrote on Jul 23
rd, 2012 at 10:57am:
We all know Australia built the finest cars and the ALP deliberately sabotaged them by lowering tariffs so imports could be sold cheaper here. They know these imports do not meet our production standards but they are happy to circumvent our standards in this way and undermine our own competitive position for personal short term gain. But these economic rationalists are selling our country and the time has come to stop it and reinstall appropriate tariffs and protections of our national sovereignty , our food security and manufacturing with appropriate tariffs and duties on imports to make sure our own trading position is not unfairly disadvantaged. The carbon tax and ETS must be scrapped or charged on imports from countries like China and India who are the real mass emissions offenders. We must stop subsidizing other nations and there peoples jobs over our own which is illegal and unconstitutional. Only the
Rise Up Australia Party has the sensible policies to secure Australia's economic future and Keep Australia Australian owned...http://riseupaustraliaparty.com 
Thats rot. The Holden and Falcon have survived on emotion alone for over a decade.
Their reliability is pathetic, and their suspension packages "for Australian conditions" couldnt be further from the truth.
The hyundai i30 won car of the year for something like 3 years in a row and it didnt change in that time.
Ford and Holden have treated their customers poorly by overcharging for heaps of rubbish. If it wasnt for the ford/holden V8SC rivalry they would have died long ago. Even NASCAR went to smaller vehicles for their main racing game long ago.
All cars have problems.
I currently own 2 Australian Fords (A Territory and a GT Falcon), and a Japanese Toyota Landcruiser. Before that I've owned 2 Nissan Patrols and a Suzuki (all Japanese).
The only fault I've had with the Fords is the GT had a gearbox oil leak fixed under warranty (ironically, a German-made ZF gearbox...). The Cruiser has had several oil leaks (Engine, transfer case), cracked bits of metal, 2 front diff failures, leaks dust like a sieve, seat material tore, rear speakers stopped working..... Between the Patrols I had to rebuild an engine due to burning oil, several electrical faults, 3 recalls, terrible and unfixable squeaks and rattles. The Suzuki's clutch failed after less than 50,000km.
My uncle had a Merc/AMG E55 which developed a computer fault. It took months and numerous return visits to the dealer to rectify.
The bottom line is that all vehicles, no matter their origin, have build and engineering faults. The Japanese cars are probably the best put together, but they have their share of major engineering faults (eg: Witness Toyota's recent long list of global recalls). The German cars are probably the best engineered, but they often have abysmal build quality (They often rank very low in customer satisfaction). And both Japan and Germany have started offshoring their builds to cheap labour countries anyway.
I'm not under any illusion that Australian cars are the best in the World. But they certainly aren't the worst and on a value basis are right up there. Of course a Falcon G6 isn't as good as a BMW 330i. But it's half the price so what would you expect?
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