[lra]

There are so many misconceptions around the demise of the industry.
Labor v Liberal, Govt interference in decision making, alternate facts. The big factor was that Ford, Holden and Toyota were not Australian companies.

As a more 'mature' car enthusiast who can remember some of the FUBARs of the time, the rot set in a long time before the inevitable.

Holden's glory days started to fade from the HQ era. Have a look at the history of how to replace the HQ platform. Gawd-awful design proposals came and went, GM procrastination, indecision and bean counting.
Cheap and easy solution, 'import' a Euro design and build Australian version. Didn't really go all that well. Then the VL engine debacle and a $700M bailout from GM put the corpse on life support. How much of the Commodore's sales were propped up by HDT and HRT success at the race track, and that image it projected.
Peter Hanenberger got under GMs skin by being too successful with exports and varied models. That had to change. Holden upstarts, how dare they.

Ford Aus always had to go to cap in hand to US HQ, to get approval for the next model, begging and pleading. How many Ford followers remember the horrible looking Zephyr facelift which was ditched for the Falcon, almost by accident.
Then, when Holden hit a six with the VT series and started expanding the variety, Ford started to wind their range back, using reasoning that there were no sales for such cars.
The capability was there, but not the interest and commitment from management, which was following US instructions.
What happened to the Aus built Focus ?
LHD exports into GMH markets ? A global Territory ? In ya dreams.
Why aren't Rangers being built in Aus ?

Toyota were collateral damage. Exporting more Camrys than were sold domestically. Plans to build the Kluger here. Too late.