It isn't as bad as that.
There are some excellent manufacturing businesses in Australia, you just never hear about them, they are too busy making money. My experience when I worked in the industry development area was that the whiners were always the uncompetitive guys who had never invested in their own business and people.
The biggest issue for Australian industry is that you must ensure you are internationally competitive, or you will fail. That is as it should be.
..And now we come full circle - to be internationally competitive, you need to travel internationally a lot......... and thanks to effing Qantas, international travel is more expensive and time consuming than it should be for Australians. Qantas is therefore a drag on manufacturing, and I'm not even goingto mention the air freight thing.