Britishvolt 'seeking stability' after gigafactory funding blow

Britishvolt’s £3.8 billion plan to create an electric vehicle (EV) battery production plant in the North East could be on the verge of collapse after a Government funding knock-back, reports suggest.

Over 3,000 direct highly-skilled jobs and a further 5,000 indirect jobs would be created if plans for the ‘gigafactory’, earmarked for a site near Blyth, Northumberland, progress.

But it is understood that efforts to facilitate the early draw down almost a third of a £100 million funding boost previously committed by Ministers might have stalled the project.

Speaking to the BBC Ian Lavery, the Labour MP for Wansbeck, where the site is based, said he had spoken to the chairman of Britishvolt on Monday who said the company asked the Government for £30m for the project to continue.

"The chairman informs me that the government have replied overnight with Grant Shapps the new business secretary, saying that they are not prepared to do that and as a consequence it very likely that Britishvolt will go into administration,” he added.

Lavery added: "It is fairly and squarely at the door of the Government for basically not agreeing to bring monies forward which will ensure that this project will continue. It is absolutely outrageous – what happened to levelling up?"

A spokesperson said the Government would not comment on "speculation or the commercial affairs of private companies".

A Britishvolt spokesman said the company was "aware of market speculation" and was "actively working on several potential scenarios that offer the required stability".

"We have no further comment at this time," he added.

Commenting on the reported issues with Britishvolt's bid to grow the UK's EV production potential, Autocar editorial director Jim Holder said: “This news will come as a blow to the prospects of car manufacturing in the UK. As the industry transitions away from traditional petrol and diesel vehicles, it will need five or six facilities of this scale to maintain production at its current levels – we currently have only one of note in the pipeline.

“The UK car industry supports 180,000 manufacturing jobs and exports worth £77bn, and without the planned gigafactory in Northumberland we are at risk of falling further behind the likes of Asia, EU and US in the race to provide essential infrastructure.”