I worked on the assembly line at Ieyland in 1973\ 74, as a leading hand on the 6 cylinder line and also did overtime on the V8 line when needed. There was never any shoddy workmanship that I can remember and did our work to the best of our ability. Yes there was a lot of different nationalities, but we all got along fine and it was good employment for all. I remember these times fondly

I remember the interior concept drawings of the design team hanging in my grandparents garage/work shop.My grandfather was one of the interior design heads and helped make the first prototypes interior. Upon retirement he was given his entire work station including sketch and design station along with his sewing machine.

They were used extensively in NZ as Taxi cabs. Very nice ride and very popular in that role.

My father bought and loved- for a time- this great big orange boat of a P76 when it first came out, and as a kid, I liked the sporty looks of the thing and the fact it had a big V-8. He had no trouble with its drivetrain but over a span of several years the vehicle basically fell to pieces around that engine. His favourite story was about some piece of trim around the windscreen which was rattling as he briefed a business colleague on the way to a serious meeting, to the point where it was flapping loose in the wind, and without stopping talking, he just calmly put an arm out the window and grabbed it as it came off, put it down beside him and kept speaking as if it were nothing :D It should be noted there's still love for the remaining P76's precisely because they got so famous for being so shit. The Australian Edsel!

I had a P76. A V8 one. With a 4 barrel manifold and a 465 Holley it actually went quite well. They only weighed 1200kg. Of course it leaked like a sieve and ultimately rusted almost in half. Fond memories none the less. The alloy V8 was 4.4l standard but with a crank from a Ford Y block (if I recall correctly) you could stretch them out to 5.0l. The engines are still quite sought after being all alloy. You could stand over an assembled engine and with your hands in the inlet manifold lift it off the ground. I also had a 2.6l 6cyl Marina but that's another story! Thanks for the blast from the past Rory!

I enjoy your style, pure information, no gimmicks. Most info channels and KZfaqrs should lern from you.

Owned one in NZ , loved it , Made the ford & Holden look like dinosaurs , Never had a problem in 4 years & sold it for more than i bought it for .

I remember the P76 being advertised on TV, I remember the windscreen wipers were hidden in a recess under the bonnet and the huge boot space. There was this ad on TV where the parking inspector couldn’t lift the windscreen wiper to attach the parking ticket.

Over many years this old man owned & loved 15 P76 cars. Loved most, hated the odd occurring faults. all long gone.Still have 5 Targa Florio mag wheels in the shed. Wish I had the money & opportunity to own another now

Good description of a good idea disastrously executed. I almost bought one new - but settled for a used Rover P5B instead. The Australian assembly plant was at ZETland (ZET rhymes with YET), not ZEETland.

My father bought the P76 V8 brand new when it came out. It proved to be a very good car, with plenty power and massive boot space which came in very handy. He only sold it when fuel prices started to climb, making it uneconomic. In all he had the P76 for 10 years and it never broke down.

Thanks for this one. I know zero about Australian BL cars, but I saw a similar collapse of British designed and engineered cars in the Caribbean, with the former colonies and commonwealths going from a nearly 100% British car stock in 1970 to maybe 10% in 1985. The Japanese stepped in and mopped up the Caribbean car market, and not just from Britain. US carmakers also had an opportunity to step in and serve the whole Caribbean car and truck market if they could have ever figured out how to make the right size vehicles and get the steering wheel on the "correct" side.

In my view the P76 suffered from two critical failures. The bean counters at Longbridge not realising the possibilities and failing to invest properly in something they didn't take the time to understand and secondly terrible timing launching during an oil crisis. The second issue could not have been predicted, the first was standard BMC/Leyland/Rover (whatever we are called this week) operating procedure.

Fabulous video Ruairidh, Didnt know about them purchasing some Holdens and a couple of other snippets. Great work!

Very compact dialogue and pretty accurate assessment of Leyland Australia’s demise. Top notch program

Excellent video. I have often wondered how the Australian factory would have prospered if it hadn't had to dance to the tune of the UK headquarters and been shut down prematurely. The P76 had so much potential. Cheers

I had a P76 V8, brilliant car, so far ahead of its time.

Found the channel by accident and just love your car videos. The video length is perfect, like a documentary and your research is superb.

My evening tea went cold while I was listening to all of Leyland s problems in Australia

Excellent report. As a Brit, I found it disgraceful that once great car manufacturers have been brought to their knees by really bad management. Some of the products were good. My Mk1 Marina Estate was brilliant, but then I regrettably got a Mk2 which was a heap of junk, thanks to designers who forgot what the customer actually wanted.

Despite all their problems, they were a far superior car to drive over the crap Holden, Valiant and Ford were producing at the time. The excellent engine was placed further back, and the car felt wider and flatter in corners. It was easy to ignore the faults in the one my brother had.

You forgot to mention the most important design feature of it. That was, it could take a 44 gallon drum in the boot. Very Australian that!

Having drove one some ten years ago i can say with certainty that the cars faults lay mostly with how it was managed by management. It looked great and drove very well... the crime was it got cut down so early in its production that teething issues never got sorted

The Rover 3.5 Litre was an aluminum V8 designed by Buick and later purchased by Rover. This engine was not used in any American pickup trucks, large or small. Very interesting and informative video otherwise

The car was so much better than anything available in Australia at the time It was far too advanced for us simple Aussies back then But it was rushed to market I think and suffered the consequences from that My grandfather had a six cylinder one and I thought it was an amazing car to drive in

This is a beautifully, thoroughly and fluently expressed account of the P76 saga, thank you!

Good video and lots of good info. The BL thing of "we own a company, they can do it" (even though they are lousy at it, ie "pressed steel Fisher") affected the Stag as well. The Stag engine was a high revving OHC engine; engineers specified a highly balanced, nitrided high speed crank. NEEDED to be outsourced to engineering companies who had experience/could do that. Oh no; we have just taken over a truck engine foundry who make clunky low revving huge/heavy truck cranks - get THEM to do it........ = idiocy. Just a small thing here. The "Holden Premier" is a bit misleading. "Premier" is the trim level (luxury, supposedly). Only a fraction of Holdens were Premiers, they were too expensive for the average Aussie. Most were Kingswoods, that was the "normal" trim level. There was a lower trim level for vans and utes (trade) and they were Belmonts. They didn't even have door armrests. I had a Belmont HQ (1971) van - The interior looked like they had forgotten to finish it, it was SOOO sparse!!! After that, I bought Brit cars. Here they were cheaper than Holden/Falcons; and "had interiors." :-) But all the facts you quote are quite close to the mark (although I find the "migrant workers none/hardly any of whom spoke English" a bit much :-) ). But there is one thing you are forgetting. If these cars had been PERFECT; there was one thing that they COULD NEVER overcome. And that is the "Holden/Ford" thing. Bathurst (racing) folklore back then was total and all consuming. Families disowned members because they "defected" from one to the other. People would initiate you into the "LOVE one/must HATE the other" cult following. For a while "Brock" was a VERY popular name for Oz boys from one of our Holden drivers. Yes, it was THAT ingrained/all consuming. I never went in for it (I thought it was ludicrous); but you had all the Holden guys over there, HATING the Ford guys on the opposite side of the pub............... and the Valiant guys were a "fringe" group. So - you walk into that pub and say "Hey!!! GREAT new car!!!! Forget your Holdens/Fords you start fights over/name your kids after/get tattoos of/dedicate your lives to/wave flags for - we have a NEW car!!!" Guys in pub say "Who makes it? Chrysler? Chev? Ford????" (The allegiance these petrol heads follow). NO!!!! It is made by the company that makes the Mini's/Morris Marina's that you would NEVER drive and barely let your wives drive!!!!!" (Cue rampant laughter ) THAT is the environment they tried to sell this car in. It was doomed before the first one even arrived. Even Valiant (with Bathurst/touring car wins with the successful Charger) couldn't make a dent. Think about that - Chrysler struggled with their background of "large cars for years." And you are trying to sell a large car made by a company who has NO lineage of large cars/ONLY known for smaller cars (in Australia anyway). HOW were you going to sell THAT???? So THAT is the main reason the P76 never went anywhere. Only Australians really understand that; and if the management had "just asked some Aussies" about that part of the market, well....... But you know company politics, once the CEO says "I have an idea!!!!" I am the kind of guy who says "hang on..." and just get sacked/moved on, CEO then says "anyone else??" and all just "agree". Oh, and Premier. In Oz, a "Prem - ee - air" is the first time a movie is shown. A "Prem - ee - ah" is a fancy trimmed Holden. And Zetland - (until recently a Navy stores depot, now fancy apartments I think) is "Zet - land". Like "let/get/bet". Not "Zeeeeet - land". Americans elongate syllables, we abbreviate them. But this vid; Good effort, interesting stuff here. BL weren't the only ones who "misread" the "need to downsize" due to fuel prices. Chrysler Aust released the new Valiant early 70's that looked HUGE right when prices started to bite.

Well done , this is an excellent and accurate description of the events that occurred, given it’s only 14 minutes long. Very well done

Our work car fleet comprised Chrysler Regals & P76. If you needed to be somewhere in a hurry, you took a P76 as they would run rings around the Chryslers plus they would start hot or cold which the Chryslers would not. I've driven a friend's Targa Florio P76 & it was a brilliant car.

We had a Blue Targa Florio P76 which had many luxuries and almost build quality issues. It was at least 5 years ahead of the competition, better handling , comfort and we overtook a Falcon GT and and SLR 5000 on a long straight country road doing 125 M.P.H.

Thanks for this video. That Holden Premier featured is an HQ model that was released at the end of 1971, not the late 1960s. 6:30 The Ford Falcon came with four engine options: a 200 CID (3.3 litre) and a 250 CID (4.1 litre) straight sixes, and a 302 CID (4.9 litre) and 351 CID (5.8 litre) V8. I assume the fuel figures you quote must be for one of the V8s. The car is referred to by some as the P38, as it was only half the car it was supposed to be. Take care.

The boot space is terrific. For a sedan to be able to easily fit a massive sound kit back in the '80s when I attended school discos run by one DJ owner, is testimony to its versatility.

Guy I knew back in the day bought a P76 for a taxi. It was an utter disaster plagued with multiple issues. Can't remember all of them now, too many years gone under the bridge, but I do remember oil consumption (think it was a V8) was a big problem. It spent more time in the workshop of Lanes Motors Frankston than on the road. Needless to say he unloaded it quick smart and bought a Ford or Holden like everyone else in the cab buisness.

An Uncle of mine had a V8 Executive manual, which I drove often. The absolute major problem with the car was that it was so far ahead of its time. Nothing on the road at the time drove as well. For some unknown reason the press went to great lengths to kill it off. What a shame....

Fascinating video. I also had no idea that Aussie and Kiwi cars had such big differences under the skin, but then I watched a whole series of videos reviews of AU and NZ-made BL cars on Hubnut.

British Leyland constantly shot themselves in the foot!

There are a number of omissions in the narrative. First, the reason why P76s were being stockpiled was due to the fact that the supply of various components bought in from outside suppliers had been disrupted due to long running industrial action by the Automotive Unions against those suppliers. For example external door handles could not be obtained and so Leyland Australia was forced to stockpile almost complete P76s until those parts could be delivered. Second, some of the limited number of coupes that were built were not crushed so that , as claimed, the few other remaining coupes might have their value increased when sold, the coupes were crushed because they were not Australian Design Rules [ADR] compliant and therefore could not be legally road registered if sold to the public. That being the case, Leyland Australia realised that it wouldn't be able to sell the coupes to the general public and so the decision was made to crush all the coupes. At the time Leyland Australia stopped its manufacturing activities, the coupe was in the process of being certificated for ADR compliance, as was the Station Wagon [Estate to you British]. Third, Leyland Australia's "A car" project was not cancelled, it was put on hold and continued on in the background under the model designation P82 being eventually scheduled for release after the P76. Forth, the P76"s boot being deliberately designed to take a 44 gallon drum is an urban myth which originated from a journalist working for a motoring magazine. True Leyland's own advertising showed Hay Bales being fitted in to the boot, but a standard Hay Bale is a lot smaller and lighter than a 44 gallon drum. Fifth, the P76 was never intended to be an Australia only model, it was intended for export to other markets as well, specifically New Zealand and South Africa. Other Leyland Australia products had already been exported to those countries, the Marina to South Africa and the Austin Kimberley / Tasman to New Zealand. And in fact, quite a number of P76 were exported to and sold in New Zealand. Sixth, the Morris Marina built in Australia was an entirely different car to that of the British version. Australian Marina's used the E series OHC 4 cylinder engine as well as having the E series 6 cylinder engine The resulting poor reputation amassed by the Marina in Australia was largely attributable to the 6 cylinder Marina. The engine was too heavy for the chassis, causing disastrous handling problems. It was also not competitive against other manufactures products, especially Ford and Holden's bigger 6 cylinder cars in terms of interior space, fuel efficiency and build quality.

The pommification of Australia was a disaster in manufacturing and the militant unions .We imported so many problems from the "motherland". When the Leyland buses were replaced with Mercedes buses in Sydney over a hundred mechanics lost their jobs ,the Mercedes were too reliable LOL

The P76 was far from a disaster and should have done much better than it did. As it turns out it ended up as a bit of an 'also ran' which is far from the dramatic use of the word 'disaster' here in this video.

Nice upload RM, showed this to my old man as well who loves his cars, both enjoyed watching!

Thanks for another great video. A popular urban legend on the internet is that one of the demands to the design was it being able to hold a 44 gallon barrel in the boot. Don't know if it's true or not, but the final car COULD hold one. Pretty good for a sedan, but also a contributing factor to it's somewhat lumpy looking rear end. Looks very sharp and Austin Princess like from the front though.

I enjoyed the video - thanks. I remember that the ACT police got P76's as patrol cars and I heard they called them "P38's" as they considered it only half a car. I also noted the aerial photo at around 11:10 of the Zetland site. I grew up just out of sight of the photo, in Kensington. I can make out the very end of Moore Park golf course, the WD&HO Wills factory and the road that is now Southern Cross Drive. The factory site has now grown many high-rise apartment blocks.

A car that was killed off by more amazing cars from Japan. Datsun 1600, 180B, Toyota Corona. And these days the P76 is a priceless collectable car.

My technical drawing teacher at high school drove a white P76 to work each day. As a kid I remember enjoying the sound of the 4.4 V8. Early 1980s.

I believe a "knock down kit" was a standard production Leyland that was driven a few miles and the pieces gathered back up from the side of the road.

The good news being that with everything learned from the P76, Austin Rover learned from it's mistakes and went on to produce the Montego.

I'm learning so many British automotive words in this video! "Boot space", "saloon car", "bonnet", "nought-to-sixty time", etc...

"The Australian consumer needed a car that was very toey ! So that's how the last of the V8 interceptors came to market!"

I worked on the P76 assembly line in Lower Hutt NZ in 1976, as I recall. It's now the site of Ulrich Aluminium. At the end, about one car per week was coming off the line, and was discontinued soon after.

The Rover V8 was a development of the 215 c.i.d. aluminum V8 designed for the compact Buick Skylark. It wasn't originally planned for truck use.

Grew up having my dad talk about the Morris major, nice to hear some history on it.

What a litany of issues, shame it didn't get the attention it needed from launch, it could have been awesome from day one. Glad to hear they're collectable now!

The P76 is yet another chapter in the catalogue of missed opportunities that is the British Leyland story. So tragically frustrating, as has been said countless times now. Still, am glad to see that a loyal following exists for these beasts in Australia today, in much the same way as the surviving BL products here at home. Cracking vid yet again. :)

I first saw a p76 when I was backpacking in oz in 2004 and doing seasonal work on a banana plantation .one was was parked in a garage on our spider and snake filled tin shack .so bad I opted to stay in my tent .I asked the farmer about the car as I thought I could buy it as I was in AWE of it.But having talked to the farmer which was a struggle as he hated us Brits .He said it was the worst car he had ever owned and had bought it new and said it basically fell to bits and wouldent get it to run right and blew a head gasket every 6 months and the air con was useless and it leaked and the car would fill with dust no matter what when driving .what really put me off in the end was the massive python under the bonnet and a brown snake under the seat as well as the massive spiders .So I left well alone as he wanted a months work for it and if I dident get it going in a week he wanted another months work .so yes I passed on this wonderful beast .I'm a big fan of Davd Bach .

Potentially this was a great car and considering it was their first effort at a large family sedan, developed in Australia ,it was way ahead of its time and I think it had the biggest trunk ever put in a car, even when it came out it was so modern and so different from all the rest that given more time for development and fine tuning , it would have been a trail blazer and then the oil crisis happened.

My uncle was a farmer and had a P76 when I was a kid. He loved it.

That was very interesting and filled in a lot of gaps in my knowledge. Thank you, sir. One observation is how much that initial underfunding (and lack of vision) influenced the subsequent problems.

The P76 was a truly remarkable car in so many ways. From comfort and space to the handling and the V8 power unit. An owner's club exists, fortunately, which allows the P76 to survive and thrive. But for the mismanagement, this was a winner in every way and had it been involved in serious PR attention it would have been the fourth vehicle in the race for racing dominance. Along with the Ford, GMH and Chrysler offerings. The Morris 1100 & 1800 were miracles of space management, with the 1800 in particular an enormous car once inside, a seeming impossibility when first viewed from outside. The models of P76 I have encountered did not have the typically claimed American build quality issues, showing only the best of its inherent nature. The Marina is a barely remembered piece of completely crass rubbish. How anyone with any sense could have proposed it be sold here at all is beyond reckoning. Where the P76 was a proper-sized car for our market, irrespective of how the mother country viewed the direction our behaviour should be directed, a massive hole developed in the Leyland range. Wave goodbye to the old country children.

There was a guy in Cobbitty (near me) who had a green one. Used to be parked next to his business for many years. Business closed, P76 gone...! Since there were only 1500 or so of them made, it is pretty rare to spot one "in the wild". It wasn't a historic rego, or anything like that - it was his daily driver.

Once we get into the Rover rebadged Honda era I start physically cringing.

Land Rover very quickly lost out to Toyota, Nissan and other Japanese 4wds. Starting in 1958 as we were one of the first big markets for LandCruiser. Lots of collectable rare ones here. With each new Landrover the annoyance accumulates.

My uncle inexplicably had two of these things, he was a sucker for a cheap second hand car. First was a 6 cyl version that had nothing going for it whatsoever, second was a v8 four speed that had some redeeming features and if someone held onto it long enough to de-bug the thing would have been ok but it wasnt given the chance by him and chopped in for the next "good deal".

Thanks for the history lesson. I was at the auction that sold the last eight Force 7. A sad day.

In the late 80s I had a mate who owned four, all v8s, including a targa florio that had it's engine bored and sleeved out to 5L, and a 4.4 that he rallied! Knew another bloke who had sixteen, yes sixteen, all V8s, only one was registered, the rest were stored in one of his dad's chicken sheds. At a car show in 88 I saw one with Rover Vitesse fuel injection fitted, purred like a kitten

Absolutely fascinating details, great vid!

It was actually highly regarded among many Australians also took out car of the year in Australia

You forgot to stress the point the P76 was given a boot (trunk for you USA folks) large enough to take a 44 gallon drum.... Soooo needed on Outback sheep farms!

I had a six cylinder white one , back in 1989 . It must have been a mid week production job , for it never played up at all . It was pleasant to drive and an interesting alternative to my Holdens , Falcons and ' Marrickville Mercedes . Car of the Year in 1973 .

The wagon survived in a rusty state in Cootamundra. I owned two of these and they were probably the best cars I had owned at the time.

I love these car stories! ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ Thank you for telling their story!

This film highlights the truism that: There are no bad men, only bad officers. Another management fail. Yet they are paid so handsomely.

The P76 had a great reception. Everyone loved the idea of an up to date Aussie big car. Mac struts. Alloy v 8. Bold styling which even today is striking. The boot was said to enough for a 44 gallon drum. Wheels magazine made it Car of the Year. The bold concept was destroyed by BL cancer. Underdevelopment. Short cuts starvation budgets. Lack of management leadership. Poorly trained workers. Poor product placement. The car was bound to tail before it reached production. Yet it was strangled before birth. The potential and advances were destroyed by the cold dead hand of Stokes and his band. Yet know its competitors. Ford Falcon. Holden Kingswood/ Commodore were on the death bed soon too. Vale P 76. They are still around snd loved. Go figure ? Great vid.

Great car, what a shame it did’nt last! Great to drive and handle.

In 1973 and1974 I worked as a clerk in the new car salesroom of a Leyland dealer in Launceston, Tasmania.16 and 17 years old then.Came from a family which bought new Buick cars and Holden utes.I got to drive XJ6 and 12 Jaguars,Rover 3500,Range Rovers,Minis and the worst cars on the planet,Leyland Marinas.Compared to Ford Falcons,Valiants and HQ Holden's the P76 was such a good handling and steering car and light years ahead of GM,Ford and Chrysler.I drove a trade in 2 yo Holden Kingswood from Hobart to Launceston and on a flat smooth bitumen road it rocked from side to side like a boat in a swell.I mentioned this to my father and he said his new 1948 Buick did that also. I was fortunate to drive the Targa Florio edition of the P76 from Launceston to Devonport and the quiet cabin,sharp steering and great handling and the very comfortable seats made for a very comfortable journey,unlike the antiquated rivals of that period.

The Buick V8 sold to Rover never powered a pickup truck. The engines were used in GM’s compact cars like the olds Cutlass, Pontiac Tempest, Buick Special

The tiny Buick V8 was never used in trucks, it powered passenger cars in the US in the 1960's. It was an early attempt to make aluminium engine blocks which had many problems.

My Dad (a mechanic) used to say P76 stood for "probably 76 hours between break-downs"... And then he went & bought a 6 cylinder Marina! Never could work that man out...

As an American it's unsettling to know that someone could screw up almost as badly as we have with our own automotive industries. Here in the states these days there's barely any quality control on new cars, and you're lucky if you can find anything resembling a tow hook, let alone figure out how to work on the damn thing. I'd love to get my hands on an old Monaro or something since the Aussies seem to enjoy building stuff to last and be serviced by normal folks. Plus, Australian muscle cars are some of the best-looking cars of that era.

As a former owner, I can certainly attest to their structural strength. I wasn’t aware of the intrusion bars. Perhaps they helped when I walked away with a sore shoulder from a 50km/h “T bone” by a Holden Statesman.

The concept was good, here in Australia we like big four door sedans that can handle rough roads, it's just I guess the UK interference was too great :/

The V8 engine had a lot of fans, in the eighties I saw a falcon rallying with one powering it, sounded great, and went well.

A very well researched and presented video, as an Aussie I really enjoyed this one. A few things you didn't mention that I think are relevant below. 1: The boot was so spacious you could literally fit a 44 UK gallon drum in there lol. 2: The Aussie Marina could be optioned with the same 2.6 litre straight six and was branded the Marina Super. 3: According to all sources the stunt of crushing the majority of Force 7V's to force the price up backfired spectacularly, most sold at or below retail price at auction and if I remember correctly at least 1 was passed in and sold 2 days later for an undisclosed sum.

Just pointing out that the footage of the 1100 on the "Dominion Motors Test Track" is actually in New Zealand...

Great video. Although they were never called a Rover Quint in Australia. It was a Rover Quintet. My mum has had one since new, even with the original alloy wheels with the Rover center emblem and Honda cast into the alloy side.

I inherited my parent's P-76 when they upgraded in the early 80s. It was too much for a 17 year old and it was eventually written off in an accident that wasn't my fault. (Driver coming the other way running a red light while I was turning right. That's said walked away just fine.)

That hydrolastic suspension seems heavenly. Wow!

Water pump pushrods ? I will not say these cars were good looking but I did drive a few of them. they were great.

I learned to drive on a Morris 1100 back in the late 70's in Nottingham. Lessons cost £2. 10p. Failed my test in it.

I had a P76.. IT was a terrific car

I remember as a teenager looking at them when first released at UK Motors in Brisbane. Even at that age I noticed the appalling fit of the doors and other hardware. I do like P76s though.

great documentary....thank you.

1 er, minor discrepancy is concerning the 0-60 time of the factory production V8 Fords. It most certainly wasn't that quick lol. Maybe the earlier race-bred XY GTHO (as you've stated in subtitles down below on clip) yes but, not the XA/XB ;)

4:20 Interesting to see a P76 registered with a 1973 British registration plate. I checked it on the Gov website and it's tax ran out in early 1974 'but' the last time the registration documents were updated was Nov 2019. So it seems the car is still in the UK. I wonder if it's in a museum somewhere?

My Pop (Grandfather) put a deposit for a V8 P76; when the company shut shop, he lost his deposit, and was even more pissed off with the Brits (being the Irishman that he was). He ended up buying an XB Falcon V8 wagon, that my uncle still has, and is still used almost weekly

Real shame they crushed all those Force-7 coupes!

Great video outlining one chapter of the terrible crash of BL from global player to obscurity.

19.4mpg that's what killed the P76 also a lot of people didn't like the the design mainly for some reason the boot, and people started to hear about bad build quality, then the price of fuel started to go up, and that killed it really, from what you have explained they lost so much money.

For those wanting to know more, an Australian feature on the P76 and covering how well it did in the 1974 World Cup Rally : kzfaq.info/get/bejne/pZZkp6uBtczQpp8.html The World Cup Rally car being hand built with a lot of care and so was good enough to win the Targa Florio section of the 1974 World Cup Rally. This achievement led Leyland to release a Taga Florio model that is likely the best of the four doors. They have also done well in recent Peking to Paris events for historic cars. Either winning this harsh event or it's class several times. So not quite a disaster in many ways. I can think of many more cars that are much more complete disasters. 44 Gallon drum in the boot demo, but would have to be empty.

What really killed British cars in Both Australia and New Zealand was Britain joining the EEC and trashing its trade agreements with both countries. Britain lost its lower import tax advantage on their cars when both countries signed deals with Japan - consumers already preferred japanese cars for both reliability and servicability, so when they were no longer 35% more expensive they sold like hotcakes

I seem to remember the talking point on the P76 when they were on the road, that they fit a 44 gallon drum in the boot.