Resources Minister Madeleine King says it would be challenging to manufacture cars on Australian soil again, after former prime minister Kevin Rudd floated the idea in a Nation Press Club address.
A car manufactured in Australia would need to be “a highly specialised type of vehicle for an extraordinarily niche market,” King said on Afternoon Briefing.
“It’s hard to get back into car manufacturing, and that’s why we’re making sure we preserve a lot of the capacities we have now, like in steel making and the smelting capacity as well in copper, for instance.
“We do make certain vehicles, the Bushmasters and Bendigo, an iconic defence-based vehicle, which is really important.
“Setting up an EV production line is going to be a challenge,” King said.
“We do need sovereign capacity. We can’t do everything.”