End of road Vauxhall workers in shock over plant closure

"I don't have anything good to say about this place right now," someone shouts, as workers flood out of the front gates of the Vauxhall van plant on Luton's Kimpton Road.

- Jack Simpson Jasper Jolly

It's lunchtime on a crisp November day in the Bedfordshire town and the early shift has just finished at the plant, which can produce up to 100,000 vans a year.

Just 48 hours earlier these workers were told by Stellantis, the plant's owners, that 120 years of Vauxhall production in the town would end and the plant would close in April.

The production of electric vans earmarked for Luton will be transferred 180 miles to Stellantis's Ellesmere Port plant in Cheshire.

More than 1,100 Vauxhall jobs are now at risk, with unions estimating that this could top 2,000 including auxiliary staff.

"I was shocked - I wanted to work here for a long time," says Haatib Afzal, who joined Vauxhall just a month ago.

The 25-year-old, who was born in Luton, is already jobhunting.

"If you look there aren't many opportunities for normal workers like me," he says.

Alf Major, who has worked at the plant for 37 years and is about to retire, says: "It's massive because this is one of the biggest employers in the town, and for the money, it is one of the best."

Vauxhall is entwined with the history of Luton and its people.

Tempted away from their original south London base, the owners of Vauxhall Motors set up on Kimpton Road in 1905.