Owner General Motors will confirm this morning that a new Astra model will be built at the plant, securing about 2,100 jobs.

Many people had feared that Ellesmere would close in a GM restructuring.

Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, told the BBC that no financial inducements were offered to GM.

GM’s investment will also mean hundreds more jobs will be created at the plant as it moves from two shifts to three.

Mr Cable described the Astra news as “a good story” and said it underlined that the UK was “a good business environment for the motor industry”.

Amid fears that the plant could close, Mr Cable held top-level talks with GM executives in an attempt to secure the factory’s future.

These talks involved “making the case that the UK is the place to be”, he said. On subsidies, Mr Cable said there would be “nothing specific”, other than the general development funds available to all companies.

The Unite union’s decision to recommend a new working agreement – thought to be a four-year deal including a two-year pay freeze – was instrumental in GM’s decision to invest in Ellesmere.

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey said: “From a position of uncertainty earlier this year, there is now a potential for a future at the plant until 2020 and beyond, and with that 700 new skilled jobs at Ellesmere Port itself, and possibly hundreds more in the supply chain.

“Importantly this move will also bring component supplier plants back into the UK, a development that strengthens our manufacturing base generally.”

However, he said he recognised that Ellesmere Port’s good news could spell bad news for other GM operations in Europe.

Opel woes

Vauxhall is the UK arm of Opel, GM’s European unit. Since 1999, Opel has lost $11bn (£7bn), almost a quarter of it during the last two or three years.

Last year, Opel lost $750m and today’s announcement about Ellesmere Port is expected to be accompanied by separate news that a factory in mainland Europe could be shut.

Analysts say that its carmaking capacity is out of step with demand. The company has been working on a restructuring plan for months.

There are fears in Germany that the Opel factory in Bochum is vulnerable to closure.

Bochum produces 30 cars an hour over three shifts a day. Ellesmere Port produces 47 cars an hour over two shifts a day – a company record.

But Germany could yet benefit from an expected decision to move production of its Chevrolet brand from Asia to Europe.

Open 24/7

As well as accepting a new pay deal, workers have also agreed a change in working practices. It is understood that the plan will keep the plant operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

That will end the long tradition in car manufacturing of plant closures in the summer and during Christmas.

Ellesmere Port plant was thought to be vulnerable because it has traditionally been politically difficult to close plants in mainland Europe.

Analysts also say it is simply cheaper and easier to let workers go in the UK than elsewhere in Western Europe.

But the willingness of unions and workers at the plant to agree to more flexible working arrangements is thought to have played an important role in GM’s decision, as has the government’s engagement on the issue in recent months.

In February, Mr Cable flew to the US and met GM’s chief executive Dan Akerson and vice-chairman Steve Girsky.

He made the case for why GM should invest in the UK for the long term. Sources suggest the meeting may have played an important role in the company’s ultimate decision to back the UK.

Although the government insists that it has not offered the company any up-front cash, there are several sources of money – including the Regional Growth Fund and the advanced manufacturing supply chain initiative – that the company may be able to access.

The university, along with Edinburgh-based Sundial Properties and Isle of Man-registered Mountgrange, want to build 116 new homes on the historic Craighouse campus.

However, the scheme is facing criticism from an organisation called the Friends of Craighouse – and the project was dealt a blow after the city’s council promised to preserve the green spaces and prioritise brownfield sites for development.

The Friends of Craighouse says it has a petition of 5,000 signatures against the plans, which have yet to be submitted to the council.

The euro fell more than a half a cent to $1.27. Against the pound, the euro slipped slightly to 79.6 pence.

The eurozone crisis also pushed Asian stocks lower and knocked oil prices.

On Tuesday, Greek politicians failed to form a coalition, meaning the country will go the polls again next month.

In elections earlier this month, the majority of Greeks voted against those parties backing drastic austerity measures agreed with the EU.

Analysts and some politicians are now openly discussing the possibility of Greece leaving the euro.

Uncertainty about the future of the euro has hit world stock markets this week, and Asian shares fell further on Wednesday. Tokyo’s Nikkei index dropped 1%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng and South Korea’s Kospi lost about 3%.

The oil price also fell. London Brent fell by $1.25 a barrel to $111, while US light crude fell $1.60 to $92.38.

Different views

There are concerns that if Greece sets a precedent by leaving the euro, other countries may follow suit.

As a result, the interest rate, or yield, on Spanish government bonds traded on the secondary market rose to 6.44% from 6.32%, while those in Italian bonds rose to almost 6%.

This indicates investors are becoming increasingly nervous about the ability of these countries to repay their debts.

Austerity measures introduced across Europe are designed to reduce debt levels that have risen significantly since in the financial crisis of 2008.

However, as anaemic growth and high unemployment grip the eurozone, an increasing number of commentators and politicians are questioning whether austerity alone is the best way out of the crisis.

Leading the calls to focus on growth is new French President Francois Hollande. He held talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who insists that austerity is the best way to cut debt levels, on Tuesday evening.

Despite their differences of opinion, the two leaders vowed to work together to resolve the crisis.

Continental Farmers Group, registered in Athol Street in Douglas, specialises in growing crops in Poland and the Ukraine.

Former UK defence minister Sir Malcom Rifkind is a non-executive director at CFG, which saw profits jump 19 per cent last year to £2.46 million.

It’s the firm’s first set of results since it floated on the Alternative Investments Market.

In the final quarter of last year, the German economy contracted by 0.2%, its first dip since 2009.

Meanwhile, the French economy recorded zero growth in the first quarter, after growth of 0.1% at the end of 2011.

Figures released later on Tuesday are expected to show that the eurozone as a whole has returned to recession.

‘Weak consumption’

Compared with the same a quarter a year earlier, the German economy grew by 1.7%.

The German statistics agency Destatis said growth in the first quarter was due to a rise in exports and higher domestic consumption.

The return to growth means Germany has avoided a so-called double-dip recession, confounding the predictions of a number of commentators.

In contrast, the French growth figures failed to outperform analysts’ expectations, and the growth figure for the final quarter of last year was revised down to 0.1% from 0.2%.

“There was no good surprise,” said Philippe Waechter at Natixis Asset Management. “There was weak consumption [and] no investment.”

Case for growth

The French GDP figures come on the day of the inauguration of the new French President Francois Hollande, who has vowed to boost economic growth.

In the run up to the presidential election, in which he ousted Nicolas Sarkozy, he campaigned hard for measures focusing on stimulating the economy alongside the austerity measures that have been adopted across the eurozone.

He will visit German Chancellor Angela Merkel later on Tuesday to make the case for growth.

Mr Hollande believes that growth rather than austerity is the best way for governments to reduce their debts, a view that is being discussed more widely as the eurozone economy continues to struggle and increasing numbers of Europeans voice their anger at austerity.

The eurozone economy contracted by 0.3% in the final quarter of last year, and many analysts believe growth figures published later this morning will show further contraction in the first quarter of this year. If they are correct, the eurozone will be back in recession.

They include chief investment officer Ina Drew, the New York Times said. Two other high-ranking executives are also set to leave, according to US media.

On Sunday, JPMorgan boss Jamie Dimon said he was “dead wrong” to dismiss concerns about trading at the bank.

Mr Dimon had previously rejected Ms Drew’s resignation, the reports said.

Ms Drew, one of the bank’s longest-standing and best-paid executives, had offered to resign a number of times since the extent of the losses became known, they added.

They were revealed in a statement on Thursday night. JPMorgan shares fell by almost 10% on Friday, wiping $14bn off the company’s value.

Further resignations

Speaking on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Mr Dimon said: “We made a terrible, egregious mistake. There’s almost no excuse for it.”

He said he did not know the full extent of the problem in April, when he described the concerns as a “tempest in a teapot”.

The losses were made at a small trading unit in London. Reports suggest that Achilles Macris, head of the unit, and Javier Martin-Artajo, a member of the desk, could both resign along with Ms Drew.

They also suggest the position of trader Bruno Michel Iksil, nicknamed the London Whale, will come under scrutiny.

The trading loss was revealed in a regulatory filing, and will dent the company’s profits, although it still expects to make about $4bn this quarter.

Overall, after accounting for other gains, losses at its chief investment office (CIO) are estimated to come in at $800m in the second quarter.

The loss could be as big as $1bn, chief executive Jamie Dimon said in an unscheduled conference call.

JPMorgan shares fell 6% after-hours, with other bank stocks following.

Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Bank of America also suffered heavy losses in electronic trading after the market close.

The strategy taken at its CIO had been “riskier, more volatile and less effective” than previously believed, Mr Dimon said.

“There were many errors, sloppiness and bad judgement. These were egregious mistakes.

“They were self-inflicted and this is not how we want to run a business.”

‘Moving on’

The CIO is an arm of the bank used to make broad bets to hedge its portfolios of individual holdings. Hedging is an investment practice used to reduce the risk of price fluctuations to the value of an asset.

The trading loss, revealed in a regulatory filing, is expected to hurt JPMorgan’s overall earnings in the quarter, and will come as an embarrassment to the bank.

It had emerged from the 2008 financial crisis in much better health than many of its rivals after avoiding risky investments that had hurt others.

“We will admit it, we will learn from it, we will fix it, and we will move on,” Mr Dimon said.

He added that the bank was trying to unload the portfolio in question in a “responsible” manner in order to minimise the cost to shareholders.

‘Too big to fail’

Mr Dimon said the type of trading that led to the loss would not be banned by the so-called Volcker rule, designed to censure certain types of trading by banks with their own money.

But he acknowledged that the errors would be particularly embarrassing, given his public criticism of the Volcker rule.

“It plays right into the hands of a bunch of pundits out there, but that’s life,” he said.

Prof Mark Williams from Boston University, and a former Federal Reserve regulator, said taxpayers should be concerned about these trading losses.

“Taxpayers ultimately have to bail out these ‘too big to fail’ banks. And that’s what JPMorgan is – it is too big to fail,” he told BBC World Service radio.

“How could a bank that’s supposed to be the premier bank in setting the leadership role allow such risk taking?”

A training workshop, held over four days, helped officials from Montserrat and Anguilla and was funded by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

It saw David Griffin from the Attorney General’s Chambers and Colin Goodwin, the Island’s Deputy Assessor of Income Tax, training tax, legal and financial officers from the two island nations.

The course comes as both Montserrat and Anguilla are setting up Tax Information Exchange Agreements with other countries – the Isle of Man has already signed 25 such agreements.

As a result, the company said it had requested for trading in its shares to be suspended with immediate effect.

It said two of its banks sold £35m of loans to supplier American Greetings.

In March, Clinton reported a loss of £3.7m for the six months to the end of January and said the outlook for 2012 was worse than previously thought.

The company said Barclays Bank and Royal Bank of Scotland had sold its loan facilities to American Greetings.

It said that although it had not breached any covenants or repayment obligations, it had been given certain temporary waivers for “technical breaches”.

Clinton said it believed that American Greetings would extend these waivers.

The move comes after the firm suffered the embarrassment of losing a shareholder vote on executive pay at its annual meeting last week.

Mr Moss had already turned down an annual salary increase following concerns among shareholders about pay levels at the insurer.

Chairman designate John McFarlane will take on the role on an interim basis.

Aviva shares rose 5% in early trading following the announcement.

The board of the company said it had asked Mr McFarlane to stay in the role while it looked for a permanent replacement among internal and external candidates.

Mr McFarlane said he was excited to take on the role.

“My first priorities are to regain the respect of our shareholders by eliminating the discount in our share price and to find the very best leader to be our future chief executive,” he added.

Aviva chairman Lord Sharman said Mr Moss had “reduced the cost base and improved operational performance” at the company.

“We should acknowledge the progress that has been achieved under [his] leadership,” he said.

Shareholder support

Last week, 54% of Aviva shareholders voted against the company’s annual remuneration report.

They were angry about the amount the new UK chief executive, Trevor Matthews, was paid when he joined, as well as the falling company share price, which has slumped by more than a quarter in the past 12 months.

It is only the fourth time that a FTSE 100 company has lost a vote on a remuneration report.

However, shareholders voted overwhelmingly to re-elect Mr Moss as chief executive, with 95% in favour.

Earlier in the week, Mr Moss had agreed not to take a rise in his pay, which would have taken his £960,000 salary to above £1m.

Last month, 26.9% of Barclays shareholders voted against its remuneration report.