All Commdores used to coem standard with manuals and most of them in my area (just across the border from you adox) were manuals, back in the VB-VH days an auto Commodore was almost unheard of around here. But most people live in citys and people in the cities prefer autos for their stop start driving so once all the cars got old and came out to the bush suddenly there were autos everywhere.
For the last few years autos and manuals cost the same on new Commodores, the manual might even cost more now?? It was good back a few years ago when you could ask for an Executive with a V8, FE2, LSD and a manual for cheaper than a posher model V6 but you can't buy a base model with a V8 anymore
I guess they have to protect the sales of the expensive sport models
