General Motors on Wednesday said it had not approached the British government to discuss a GBP600m (EUR647m; US$859m) aid package for its Vauxhall brand, as the Financial Times newspaper reported on Wednesday.

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The FT, quoting Tony Woodley, joint general secretary of trade union Unite, had said Vauxhall’s managing director raised the request with the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), according to Reuters.


But GM denied it had asked for funds as talks regarding GM Europe (GME) needed to be resolved first.


“We’ve been having top level discussions with BERR about the GME viability plans. But we haven’t yet got to the stage of what we need in the UK in terms of support,” GM’s director of UK communications, Denis Chick, told the news agency.


Chick was not immediately available to comment to just-auto.

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In February, GM Europe submitted a rescue plan for Vauxhall parent Opel, owned by US-based GM, under which Opel and Vauxhall would be partly spun off into a new subsidiary. It said the independent unit would need EUR3.3bn (US$4.4bn) in state aid with EUR2.6bn of that from Germany for Opel.


“Once that plan in Germany has got down to its fine details … then we will bring that detailed plan to the UK government and talk about what potential aid we might need in the UK,” Chick told Reuters.


The FT’s report came after US president Barack Obama on Monday said recovery plans submitted to the US government by GM and Chrysler did not go far enough and warned of the possibility of managed bankruptcies.


He gave both companies a little more time and funding to win further concessions from workers, creditors and other stakeholders.