Car trade in first surplus since 1976
BRITAIN has posted its first quarterly trade surplus in cars since 1976 after cashing in on rising foreign demand for vehicles made in the UK.
The value of car exports hit £6.1bn in the first quarter of the year, £561m ahead of the value of imports and up 20 per cent on the final three months of 2011.
It comes after a series of commitments to Britain by major foreign car companies, such as Nissan, which is due to spend £127m on building a new hatchback in Sunderland and Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), which will create 1,000 jobs at its Merseyside factory.
Yesterday’s figures also show the volume of cars exported leapt 21.8 per cent in the first quarter of the year while imports rose 5.8 per cent. They come as a boost for David Cameron’s flagging plan to drag Britain out of recession with a recovery in exports and manufacturing
Separately yesterday JLR, part of India’s Tata Motors, said April sales rose 29 per cent to 25,143 against the same month last year.
Overall Britain’s trade deficit narrowed to a seasonally adjusted £2.7bn in March, compared to £2.9bn in February, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Both overall goods exports and imports values hit a record high in March. Export growth was driven by sales of pharmaceuticals and cars to non-EU countries such as the US and China, but also to Germany. The goods trade deficit inched down to £8.56bn in March from £8.59bn in February.