The world's biggest car company, General Motors, wants to build 220,000 revolutionary plug-in hybrids here every year by 2015. Bosses from the firm yesterday met Gordon Brown to push for a deal with the Government. n return for creating up to 500 jobs, the company wants a pledge from the Prime Minister that he will order public charging points for electric cars to be installed on thousands of British streets.
Under the proposals, workers at GM's plant in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, would build enough hybrid Vauxhall Flextremes to supply the whole of Europe. Between 20,000 and 30,000 of the cars would be produced by around 2012, and this would rise to 220,000 by 2015. Some 40,000 a year would be sold in the UK. An insider at Vauxhall, which is owned by GM, said: 'Britain could become the electric car capital of Europe.'