'Fighting for the future of our car plant'

MP for Ellesmere Port

SO HERE we go again – fighting for the future of our car plant at Ellesmere Port where thousands of my constituents and others have secured productive and lucrative careers over the years.

We were overjoyed a couple of years ago when Stellantis – modern-day owner of what we have long known as Vauxhall’s on the Cheshire/Wirral border – announced what seemed like a rosy future for the plant.

Stellantis managers had made clear that the company intended to move to electric vehicle (EV) production at Ellesmere Port. It followed huge efforts put in over recent years to secure the future of the plant and involved significant contributions from management, the workforce, the local authority and indeed the Government.

But all of those efforts have been put in doubt after representatives of Stellantis told a House of Commons inquiry that the future of the Ellesmere Port had been placed in doubt because of the unfavourable terms of a key trade deal between the UK and the European Union relating to the supply of batteries for EV manufacture. As this story broke leading the BBC News at 10pm, it was clear that the issues raised went far beyond Ellesmere Port and were a clear warning that the move to electric vehicles would be extremely problematic under the changes to the trade deals currently planned. As there was a national perspective I was able to persuade Mr Speaker to grant an Urgent Question in the House of Commons last week. In that I told Nusrat Ghani MP, Minister of State at the Department for Business and Trade: “The warnings from Stellantis…are deeply concerning, not just for my constituents who work at Vauxhall Motors in Ellesmere Port, but for the automotive sector more widely. I drew the Minister’s attention to the critical need for a strategy covering our manufacturing industry and our automotive sector.

Sadly I thought the Minister’s response showed a complete lack of understanding of what the issues are as well as a total complacency about the threat to UK manufacturing and the automotive industry. She talked about the investment that had already been made but failed to address the nub of the problem which is that what are known as the “rules of origin” in the trade agreement which specify the amount of a vehicle that has to be manufactured in the same country will cause difficulties in terms of costs and tariffs in future unless the trade agreement changes and we are able to build more of the vehicle, especially the batteries in the UK, the car industry in the country is at risk. I hope that the Parliamentary activity on this last week will act as the spur needed for the Government to finally address this.

ON A sad note I have been informed of the passing of a great community stalwart in Ellesmere Port – Phyllis Kewn. Phyllis, who died on May 7 after a short illness, was for many years the leading light at Overpool Community Centre where she devoted hours after hour of her time for half a century. Her efforts were rightly hugely appreciated by me and across the community and our thoughts are with her family.