British cars could become more competitive

By Neil Dowling on 30th June 2016 Regulations Brexit, Imports, UK

FALLOUT from the Brexit referendum – and its potential to have a crushing effect on the British currency – indicates that exports from the UK will be cheaper, potentially bringing down the price of British-made cars or adding value to their standard features.

Either way, if the Pound stays down while the ramifications from the leave vote is processed, Australian importers and dealers can expect British-made cars to become more competitive.

Australia bought more than 32,000 cars from the UK in 2015, our sixth-biggest source of imported vehicles from a list of 26 countries.

In 2016 to the end of May, 14,874 vehicles were sourced from the UK with the highest number from Jaguar Land Rover with 7054 units.

This was followed by Nissan‘s Qashqai and Juke with a total of 6082 year-to-date, then Honda with about 600 units of the Civic hatch and the CR-V diesel.

Honda sources the Civic hatch and the Honda CR-V diesel from the UK while other Honda models come from Thailand and the Odyssey is made in Japan.

Honda Australia group public relations manager Neil McDonald told GoAutoNews Premium: “Officially, it is not clear what conditions and rules will ultimately replace the UK’s membership of the EU.

“Honda will continue to monitor developments. At present, the company is continuing to prepare for the production launch of the 10th-generation Civic from our Swindon plant in the UK. Going forward, Honda Motor remains committed to its business in Europe.”

While Nissan imports the Juke and Qashqai SUVs from its UK plants, it will also import the Infiniti Q30 hatch from the third quarter of this year.

Nissan would not comment on future production or pricing.