Some £200m more than usual was withdrawn from branches of Santander UK on Friday after the downgrading of its credit rating and that of its parent group in Spain. The bank, however, said this was only a “modest increase” – less than 0.2% of its retail deposits and tiny compared with the bank’s liquidity buffer of £35bn.

Should I be worried about Santander?

The bank is keen to underline just how much it is ring-fenced from its Spanish operations. Santander’s UK operation is wholly-owned by, but autonomous from, Banco Santander. It is authorised and regulated by the UK’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) and a spokesman says it has its own balance sheet, separate from its parent company.

He also says 90% of the UK bank’s balance sheet is UK-related money. “Sovereign exposures to Europe [excluding the UK] at 31 March 2012 were not significant, at less than 1% of total assets, and primarily related to Swiss government securities,” he says. “Total exposure to eurozone periphery countries was less than 0.3% of total assets.”

If the parent company wanted to extract money from the UK bank it would have to sell it or pay itself a dividend, but that would only be approved by the FSA if it met strict UK capital requirements. In short, this means if the Spanish part of the bank was in trouble it could not prop itself up with money extracted from the UK bank.

The spokesman says: “Both Santander and Santander UK are strong businesses focused on retail banking with no exposure to toxic financial products. Santander’s UK business is strong and has a standalone credit rating which is one of the highest credit ratings of any UK bank.”

Ray Boulger of mortgage brokers John Charcol says Santander is “probably the safest bank in the UK” because nearly all its savings and lending is in the UK. “If it gets very messy in Europe the knock-on effect is likely to hit other banks such as Barclays and Lloyds more than it would hit Santander,” Boulger adds.

So are my savings safe?

UK consumers with money in Santander are protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. This covers deposits of up to £85,000 held in the bank, or £170,000 for couples, and includes money previously held in Alliance & Leicester or Abbey accounts. If the worst did happen you would get that much money back, although it could take up to six months for your claim to be processed. The standard consumer advice is not to hold more than £85,000 in the account of any UK bank, Santander included.

What if I have my mortgage with them?

There’s bad news for anyone secretly hoping something will go wrong so they can escape repaying their mortgage or other debts: if a bank or building society fails you will still be liable to pay off your debt. David Hollingworth of mortgage broker London & Country says: “When banks have got into difficulty before, the bank has either been sold on or the mortgage book has been sold … your liability remains the same and the terms and conditions on your mortgage would continue to be the same.”

Will I still be able to get a mortgage from Santander?

It’s going to get tougher than it already is. Mortgage brokers report that in recent months Santander, which along with HSBC has been one of the few “volume” lenders during the financial crisis, has begun withdrawing from the market.

Mark Harris, chief executive of broker SPF Private Clients, says: “Santander has pulled back significantly in terms of lending volumes this year. It is demonstrating much less of an appetite to lend, which is having a knock-on effect on other lenders and their service levels, because in recent years Santander has done significant volumes of lending. Other lenders are having to pick up the slack, and more applicants inevitably mean longer processing times.”

Ben Thompson of L&G Mortgage Club, which sources nearly one in 10 mortgages in the UK, says: “The fact Santander has been lending less to the market since the beginning of the year has meant that much of this demand has now permeated to some of the other lenders. Consequently, many of those lenders have been faced with increased demand that they are struggling to meet.”

The cut in Santander’s credit rating is likely to increase the cost of the bank’s funding, making it more difficult to offer best-buy mortgages. The bank has already slashed its interest-only offering, demanding borrowers put down at least a 50% deposit. If the crisis deepens all banks, not just Santander, are likely to tighten already tight lending criteria.

Is this a great time to buy shares in Santander?

The bank’s shares, quoted on the Madrid stock exchange, are still held by hundreds of thousands of UK small investors from the days when Abbey demutualised, only to be bought later by Santander.

In March 2009 after the collapse of Lehman they plummeted to just €4.14, then within eight months bounced back to €11.96. This week they were back at 2009 levels, hitting €4.37, but today are trading slightly up at €4.59. According to stockbrokers Hargreaves Lansdown banks were the most heavily traded shares among small investors this week, although he noted they have turned from net buyers to sellers.

Big investors warn that now is not the time to jump in. Tom Dobell, who runs the £8bn M&G Recovery fund which specialises in buying shares of distressed companies it thinks will bounce back, is hugely negative on the banks. “[They] have been run for the benefit of themselves, not shareholders. The only one I’d cross the road for is HSBC. The others can wait outside the back door,” he says.

German-Greek relations were further strained on Friday after the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, was heard advising Greece to hold a referendum on its membership of the euro.

Greek politicians reacted angrily, but Merkel’s aides insisted she had not suggested a referendum during a telephone call on Friday with the Greek president, Karolos Papoulias.

The Greek government’s spokesman, Dimitris Tsiodras, said: “[Merkel] relayed to the president thoughts about holding a referendum in parallel with the elections on the question whether Greek citizens wish to remain in the eurozone.”

A German government spokesman rejected the idea that Merkel had proposed a referendum. “This is false and we completely dismiss this,” he said.

Some commentators suggested that the misunderstanding was due to an error in translation. One said that Merkel had said that the 17 June elections in Greece would be like a referendum on the country’s membership of the euro.

But Greek politicians criticised Merkel’s perceived interference in Greek affairs.

Alexis Tsipras, the leader of the leftwing Syriza party that wants to renegotiate Greece’s bailout by the EU and the IMF, said: “Ms Merkel is used to addressing Greece’s political leaders as if the country was a protectorate.”

Antonis Samaras, a conservative, also criticised Merkel’s suggestion. “The Greek people don’t need a referendum to prove they’re pro-euro. Her idea is unfortunate, to say the least, and can’t be accepted,” he said.

The elections will take place amid confusion in Greece over which economic path to take. Opinion polls suggest that Greeks want to remain in the euro but do not want to abide by the austerity programme demanded as part of the international deal to finance Greece’s debt.

Merkel and other European leaders have told Greece they must continue the austerity programme if they want to remain in the single currency.

What’s in the Budget for you? With speculation rife about what chancellor George Osborne will announce, we speak to a middle, high and low earner to find out their expectations – and fears – for the next year

The middle earner

The Ceraldi family: ‘Stiched up’.

Like thousands of other middle income earners, Dominic Ceraldi hasn’t had a pay rise this year. As a result, he says, his family’s budget has become even more squeezed over the past 12 months as the cost of “almost everything” has gone up.

The HR manager, who works in central London for Pimlico Plumbers, earns almost exactly the median average salary for those who work in the capital – around £43,000, but is reluctant to replace the family car he sold over a year ago because he’s not sure he can afford to run one.

Ceraldi, who came south from his native Lancashire to work, says he feels as though he has been “completely stitched up” by the coalition government that has targeted so many cuts on families with children in his income bracket.

He is one of the 750,000 who were caught in one of George Osborne’s first acts – the move to lower the threshold at which point earners start paying higher rate (40%) tax. He, his wife, who now works as a part-time teaching assistant and their six-year-old son, have already lost tax credits worth £545 a year. They also face losing £1,055 from next year if the government goes ahead with its controversial plan to withdraw child benefit entirely for households that include one higher rate tax payer.

“Don’t get me wrong, we are not pleading poverty and there are many others that are far worse off than us. However, we don’t feel well-off and don’t understand why we are being taxed as such. It certainly hasn’t got any easier over the last year,” he says.

Next month the rent on their small home in Silvertown, east London, will rise by around £45 a month. The cost of his travelcard has also risen by £5 a week. Water bills are on the up, and his only cost saving has come in lower gas and electricity bills after ditching the pre-paid meter the family inherited from the previous tenant.

He says they’d like to buy a car to replace the VW he was forced to sell last year in a bid to lower the family’s outgoings but is worried the cost of fuel and insurance would put unnecessary pressure on other parts of their budget. Higher food bills have also taken their toll, he says.

“I will be very annoyed if the government goes ahead and takes away child benefit. They recently suggested that for most on higher incomes it would be like giving up the family curry on Friday night. I can assure them it doesn’t get used for that purpose where we are – it all just goes into the family pot. Those who voted Liberal at the last election must be furious to be getting this,” he says.

How middle income earners may fare in the Budget

• Tax Credits A whole raft of changes to tax credits are set to come into force on 6 April 2012, hitting families earning over £26,000.

The system is incredibly complicated but, broadly, from April you probably won’t get child tax credit if you work at least 30 hours a week, have one child and your annual income is more than £26,000. Those with two children earning over £32,200 are similarly affected. In both cases they lose £545 a year. You could still qualify from 6 April if your income is above these amounts if you pay for approved childcare, are disabled, or have more than two children.

The only bright spot is that those who do qualify for tax credits, may receive more. For example, a family with two adults (both working full time) and two children but no childcare costs, with an income of £25,000 a year, will see their tax credits rise by £270 to £2,978 a year after April.

A couple with two children, a household income of £40,000, but childcare costs of £300 a week will also see a £270 a year rise to £7,748 after April.

There are also new hours rules for couples with children who claim working tax credit.

At the moment, if you are responsible for at least one child, you have to be in employment for at least 16 hours a week to qualify. From 6 April, in most cases, your joint working hours will need to be at least 24 hours a week to qualify. Single parents need only work 16 hours.

• Child benefit changes The government is committed to removing child benefit from any household that includes a higher rate taxpayer – those earning at least £42,475 from April 2013.

Child benefit, frozen last year, is £20.30 a week for the first child, and then £13.40 for subsequent children. A family with two children currently receives £1,752.40 a year.

Critics say the plans unfairly penalise stay-at-home mothers, where the father earns around £45,000 a year. A couple next door, each earning £40,000 a year with children would keep their child benefit under the current plans.

Expect some changes on in the Budget, or a raising of the threshold at which it is removed. At the very least Osborne will say he’s looking at “the new tax on marriage”, as it has been dubbed, with an announcement possible in the autumn statement.

• Fuel duty Last November Osborne conceded that operating a car is a necessity rather than a luxury for many households as he halted a proposed 3p a litre fuel duty increase on petrol and diesel due to come into force in January this year. Fuel duty is set to rise 3p a litre in August. Cancelling that too would be popular, but is not expected as a lot can happen to oil prices between now and then.

The high earner

Tony Stein: ’50p rate hits normal people’.

Tony Stein is founder and director of Canterbury Care, which operates 11 care homes across the UK. Last year his earnings “just about touched” the £150,000 level at which further income is taxed at 50%. He joined more than 500 bosses of small and medium-sized companies who signed a letter to the Daily Telegraph in February calling for the 50p rate to be scrapped as it was damaging the economy.

“The tax, which is in effect a 58% tax after national insurance is taken into account, puts wealth creators like us in a very awkward position,” the letter said, adding: “Repealing the 50p tax would demonstrate the chancellor’s wish to celebrate British entrepreneurialism, stimulate industry and contribute to the government’s growth agenda.”

Stein, 47, says he is “more than happy to dig deep” at a time of austerity to help out those less fortunate. Although he adds: “We employ 455 people, but we have £14m in borrowing, and a big mortgage on my home. At the end of the day I have my neck on the line. Yes, I earn £150,000 or so, but it’s me who has sleepless nights over the borrowings and operations of the business, and it’s me who works all weekend. It’s not as if I’m earning millions. Actually, what has me shouting at the telly is the executives of big banks who earn millions but aren’t putting their own money at risk. The 50p rate is hitting normal people like me.”

Higher taxes come at a time when the care home business is challenging, he says. “We are having to cope with higher fuel costs, regular increases in the minimum wage, everything is going up – but at the same time the fees we are able to charge are going down, and occupancy levels are down because local authorities don’t have the money to place people in care.”

But would a high earner such as Stein really be less inclined to be entrepreneurial, less likely to invest or less likely to employ people simply because income over £150,000 is taxed at 50%? “I take a broad view. I wouldn’t really care if the rate was 60p in the pound. What I’m concerned about is, the 50% rate is now one of the highest in the world and we are no longer the go-to place for entrepreneurs.”

He adds that, in his own situation, higher tax means he has less to invest in other businesses. “I’ve got a lot of friends who earn above £150,000. Most of them started businesses. This isn’t about being greedy. The more tax that is taken, the less disposable income there is for people like me to reinvest into businesses and create jobs.”

He’s not optimistic that the chancellor will remove the 50% rate, but says he would like to see him announce a fixed date for when it will be abolished, plus a 10% rate for those who earn over £5m.

“At the moment, people in that league go offshore and don’t pay anything in tax. If we taxed them at 10%, at least we get something. At the moment, we get 50% of nothing.”

How high earners may fare in the Budget

• 50% tax rate Currently, earnings above £150,000 are taxed at 50%, called the “additional rate”. The 40% rate applies to earnings above £35,000 which, once the personal allowance of £7,475 is added, means most people start paying on salaries above £42,475.

The government has already announced that the starting point for the 40% tax band will remain at £42,475 in 2012-13, which inevitably means that more people will start paying 40% tax than before. Few commentators now believe Osborne has the nerve to axe the 50% rate for the coming tax year, although the chancellor may announce a date when it will be removed.

• 60% anomaly High earners are more hopeful for a revision to the 60% anomaly in the tax system.

This arises on incomes between £100,000 and £115,000 as personal allowances are withdrawn, and means that earnings in that band are taxed more heavily than earnings above £115,000. Broadly, you lose £1 of personal allowance for every £2 of earnings over £100,000.

For example, on earnings of £104,000 to £105,000, the earner pays 40% in income tax (£400) but they also lose £500 of their personal allowance, which works out at an effective 60% tax deduction on earnings.

The chancellor may look at different ways of tapering the loss of personal allowance.

• Mansion tax This Lib Dem proposal to tax homes at 1% of their value above £2m could raise as much as £1.7bn, with around 40,000-50,000 homes falling into the net. A £2.5m home would pay £5,000 a year, while a £5m home would pay £30,000. It is billed as the Lib Dem quid pro quo for letting their coalition partners scrap the top 50% tax rate.

But if Osborne keeps the higher rate he’s extremely unlikely to introduce this as well.

• Tycoon tax This flat-rate levy would ensure the wealthiest can no longer dodge taxes through various wheezes dreamed up by accountants. Mooted by Nick Clegg, it has split the Lib Dems, but recent reports suggest the chancellor is considering some form of minimum levy to avoid exploitation of tax loopholes by the rich.

• Pension tax relief The idea is that it’s unfair that the better-off gain most of the benefit from tax relief on pensions. For every £1 a higher rate taxpayer puts into a pension, he or she receives 40p in tax relief, while a basic rate taxpayer earns relief at just 20p in the pound.

Limiting relief to 20p in the pound overall would save the government billions, but pension experts such as Baker Tilly say making changes to pension tax relief is a Gordian knot.

An easier option to raise revenue might be to reduce the current £50,000 cap on annual contribution levels into a pension.

The low earner

Alison Fulcher: Reliant on tax credits.

Alison Fulcher is crossing her fingers that the chancellor won’t announce fresh cuts to the tax credits that she, and many other low-income households, rely on.

Fulcher, a 41-year-old single parent, holds down two jobs – she works as an art tutor, teaching a group of adults with complex needs and learning difficulties, and is also a support worker for a charity in Brentwood, Essex, where she lives. “At the moment, I work about 20 hours a week and rising. I’d love it to be full-time, and hopefully it will be,” she says.

Thousands of families will be affected by changes to the tax credit system that take effect on 6 April. Couples with at least one child will, between them, need to work at least 24 hours a week to continue receiving working tax credit – up from 16 at the moment. However, because Fulcher is a single parent, she is not affected.

She will also escape another change taking effect on the same day – a slashing of the annual income limit for child tax credit eligibility – because she earns less than the new, lower income threshold of around £26,000 for people with one child.

Fulcher currently receives both of these tax credits and says: “I’m reliant on it.” Cutting, or freezing, tax credits would be “difficult” for people in her position, though she adds that she wouldn’t want those earning a bit more to be “taxed unfairly”.

She supports the proposal to raise the income tax threshold to £10,000 to ensure low-paid workers are exempt from paying tax (see right).

Fulcher, whose daughter is 15, has been divorced for more than 10 years and does not receive financial support from her ex-husband. She was a property owner until about four years ago, and now rents a terraced house, for which she pays around £750 a month.

Like millions of other people, she has felt the impact of rising petrol and food costs. “I use my car an awful lot with my work. Petrol is quite a large part of my weekly budget.” She adds: “We very rarely eat out. I must admit, if we have an indulgence, it is cooking the things we like.”

Fulcher has received support from Gingerbread, the charity for single parents, which offers advice and information on benefits and other issues.

How lower income earners may fare on in the Budget

• Income tax allowance The government is committed to taking low-income earners out of tax by gradually raising the income tax allowance to £10,000. The allowance is due to increase by £630 a year to ensure the £10,000 target is met by April 2015, although senior Lib Dems would like to see this accelerated.

We will find out on in the Budget whether they have had any success with their lobbying.

In April 2011 the personal allowance for people under 65 rose from £6,475 to £7,475 for the 2011-12 tax year, and it has already been announced that next month it will rise again to £8,105 for 2012-13.

However, the basic rate limit will fall by £630, taking it from £35,000 in 2011-12 to £34,370 in 2012-13 to ensure higher-rate taxpayers do not benefit from the increase. In 2010-11 the basic rate limit stood at £37,400.

• Tax Credits See above.

• VAT The standard rate of VAT rose from 17.5% to 20% in January 2011, and there have been plenty of calls for it to be cut to stimulate growth and ease the pressure on household budgets.

Banks and building societies are introducing “stealth” changes to their mortgage ranges to make it harder for borrowers to qualify for loans, as well as increasing their interest rates.

Since the credit crunch lenders have been operating strict lending criteria, such as asking for much more detail about someone’s financial situation, but in recent weeks they have been making small tweaks which are further reducing the number of borrowers who qualify for deals.

Halifax, for example, has restricted the availability of its two-year, fixed-rate loans for anyone wanting to remortgage via a broker. Whereas previously it offered deals of up to 85% of the price of a property, it will now only lend up to 75%. It has also reduced the number of two-year fixes for purchases, with the effect that anyone borrowing between 75% and 85% loan-to-value (LTV) will pay more.

This comes against a backdrop of economic conditions that mean mortgage rates will almost inevitably rise further. Yesterday, the Bank of England warned that the worsening eurozone crisis could mean that UK households will suffer higher interest rates.

“Lenders are now making a lot of stealth changes to make it tougher to get a mortgage,” said Andrew Montlake of mortgage brokers Coreco. “Together with increasing their rates, they are carefully controlling their market share so they do not get deluged with business they can’t cope with.”

Porting changes

Although increasing numbers of homeowners are requiring flexibility in porting a mortgage, as a sluggish housing market means sellers waiting to complete are sometimes having to move into a short-term rental property rather than risk losing their buyers, lenders are moving in the opposite direction.

Nationwide building society has made it harder for people moving house to port a mortgage from one property to another one. Borrowers who could previously redeem their old mortgage and take the same deal out with the building society on a new property six months later now have just a three-month window. They can also only take up that same deal again if they have told Nationwide of their intentions before redeeming the old loan – something that wasn’t required previously.

Woolwich has also tightened its porting criteria. David Hollingworth of brokers London & Country said: “Now you have a 30-day window to redeem your mortgage on your old property and start it up again on your new one. Otherwise, Woolwich will only reimburse you any early redemption charges if you take out a different loan with it within six months.”

Reduced choice for first-time buyers

Santander has made a number of changes to its product range, some of which constrain first-time buyers.

“It [Santander] has recently reduced the maximum number of applicants on its loans from four people to two and has changed the way it assesses afforadbility,” Montlake said. “It now wants a lot more detail, to the point of asking things like whether or not you put money aside for birthday and Christmas presents. If you have any kind of credit record blip it is also now an automatic no.”

The bank has also reduced the maximum LTV available on new-build properties from 90% to 85%.

A number of lenders have recently stopped lending on an interest-only basis, or drastically cut the number of people who will qualify for these loans.

The Co-operative bank, which includes the old Britannia building society, recently became the latest lender to entirely withdraw its interest-only range. Santander and others have limited interest-only deals to borrowers with a minimum 50% downpayment, effectively excluding first-time buyers.

Rising interest rates

Meanwhile, mortgage rates have been rising in small increments over a number of months, and lenders are pulling best-buy deals from the market almost as soon as they have appeared in some cases.

“It’s not just a sales spiel anymore to say to borrowers that if they see a really good rate to grab it. It really is the case that it could be gone in days,” Montlake said.

Nationwide has bucked the trend and announced it has cut the cost of some deals for the second time this month, this time on all its two- and five-year fixed rates by 0.10%. It has also cut its fees. Its best deal is a five-year fix at 3.89% up to 70% LTV with a £550 fee.

The Post Office has a better deal at 3.59% up to 75% LTV with a £1,495 fee, while HSBC has a two-year fix at 2.64% up to 60% LTV with a £2,000 fee.

“We have no idea how much rates will go up by and how quickly, so now taking a five-year fix where the rates look good value makes a lot of sense,” Montlake said.

The Vauxhall car plant at Ellesmere Port has been saved from closure, preserving 2,100 jobs and creating 700 more, after workers accepted a deal that will result in the next-generation Astra built at the factory.

The business secretary, Vince Cable, visited the plant on Thursday to mark an agreement that, in a rare reversal of industrial fortune, could lead to the closure of a sister plant in Germany.

The European arm of General Motors, Opel/Vauxhall, will split production of the new Astra model between the Cheshire site and a plant in Gliwice, Poland, with Opel’s factory in Bochum, Germany, likely to lose out as a consequence.

Ellesmere Port and Bochum had been chosen by GM executives as the plants most likely to close, triggering frantic lobbying by British politicians and trade union officials that appears to have paid off. GM is attempting to cut losses at its European operations that reached $747m (£470m) last year.

Workers at the plant voted 94% in favour of new pay and conditions under the deal, clearing the way for the £125m investment to go ahead.

Cable, an Astra owner, told the Guardian the government had serious concerns over the future of Ellesmere Port earlier this year. “At the beginning,” he said, “we were very concerned because it was clear that GM were committed to substantial downsizing in Europe. But we thought that this was one of the most productive plants and it was not being fully utilised. We had a good story to tell about the British car industry.” Cable said the plant had been saved by a “team UK effort” that included officials at the Unite trade union, led by former general secretary Tony Woodley.

Asked about the Bochum plant, Cable said: “I don’t want to be triumphalist but the fact that they have chosen to commit to the UK rather than the German plants is a significant statement in a way.

“But rather than dance up and down on Germany I would prefer to leave it as a positive story for us.” Cable said he would be “in the market” for buying the new Astra when it rolls off the Ellesmere Port production line from 2015 onwards.

Welcoming the news, David Cameron said: “This is excellent news for Ellesmere Port and for UK manufacturing. Once again we have seen the success of the UK automotive industry and the crucial role it plays in growing and rebalancing our economy.

“This has been a real team effort with the government, the company, unions and workers all focused on keeping production in the UK.”

The government is expected to support the expansion of Ellesmere Port through supply chain and apprenticeship initiatives.

Unite’s current general secretary, Len McCluskey, said the plant’s future had been guaranteed into the next decade. “This is extremely good news for Ellesmere Port. The company has made an offer to the workforce, which our members have accepted.

“From a position of uncertainty earlier this year, there is now a potential for a future at the plant until 2020 and beyond, and with that, 700 new skilled jobs at Ellesmere Port itself, and possibly hundreds more in the supply chain.”

The site is 50 years old this year and employs 2,100 workers, plus a further 700 suppliers on the site. The directly employed staff have accepted a new labour agreement that includes a pay deal. Woodley played a significant role in negotiating the deal, which will result in Ellesmere Port ratchet^{ing up to a 24-hour production cycle, from two daily shifts to three.}

GM is not the only carmaker scrutinising its European operations. Analysts believe the industry in Europe is more than 3m units over capacity. GM owns seven plants in Europe, including a van factory in Luton, which is not under immediate threat. Ellesmere Port builds the Astra Sports Tourer, making 140,000 models last year. The plant was built in 1962, producing its first car, a Viva, two years later. As well as creating 700 new jobs, the new agreement will see £125m invested in the plant, which will produce a minimum of 160,000 vehicles per year.

The doubts about Ellesmere Port’s future have been the only cloud over a UK car manufacturing industry that is enjoying a renaissance from the post-crash lows of 2008-09. Britain made about 1.34m cars last year, an increase of 6% on 2010. A large contributor to the boom is demand in emerging markets for premium cars, such as Minis, Land Rovers and Bentleys – all made in the UK.

However, the mass-produced market has been suffering across Europe and Ellesmere Port has been caught by that crisis. Nonetheless, other mass producers based in the UK, such as the Japanese trio of Honda, Toyota and Nissan – the biggest car producer in the UK – have boosted their British production plans in recent months.

Vauxhall’s chairman, Duncan Aldred, said: “This is great news for the Ellesmere Port plant, our employees, the local community, our suppliers, the Vauxhall brand and the UK. We have been able to develop a responsible labour agreement that secures the plant’s future. This is assisted by the government’s industrial strategy: increasing its focus on the manufacturing sector and creating ideal ground for companies to build up long-term investments.”