Representatives from Germany’s federal and state governments were believed to be meeting today to evaluate General Motors’ plan for its Opel division.
Opel has requested EUR2.7bn (US$3.67bn) in loans and loan guarantees from countries across Europe where it has production, but has declined to reveal the breakdown by state.
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Germany is thought to have been asked for EUR1.5bn, although this has not been confirmed by the federal ministry of economics and technology.
Such financial backing is in addition to the EUR600m from parent GM and will be used in Opel restructuring, which will see capacity cut 20% and 8,300 redundancies in total.
The carmaker has said it would continue to work with European governments where it had production, notably Germany, the UK, Spain, Poland and Austria, to secure funding of approximately EUR2.7bn through loans or loan guarantees.
The Spanish goverment said recently its financial backing for Opel would depend on acceptance by GM’s Spanish workers, the majority of whom are at the large assembly plant near Zaragoza.
Calls to Germany’s federal ministry of economics and technology seeking comment were not returned.
