Land Rover has confirmed 1,300 job losses at its Solihull plant - as the company enjoys the biggest sales boom in its 58 year-history.

The cuts result from Land Rover's decision to switch production of its Freelander model to Merseyside.

The company said it was confident the job losses at the 4x4 specialist's Lode Lane factory would be achieved through voluntary redundancies.

It has been known that about 1,000 jobs would be lost since July 2003 when Land Rover announced the replacement for the existing Freelander would be built alongside the Jaguar X Type at parent group Ford's giant Halewood plant - formerly the home of the Ford Escort - on the outskirts of Liverpool.