ALL CHANGE SINCE 2005

Our previous Round Britain tour in 2005 was done in three parts by three writers. Richard Bremner and Ben Oliver did the first two stints and I got the tail end. Starting in Dartford, I went to Hethel — which was still busy producing the VX220 for GM at the time — then Sunderland, TVR in Blackpool, Halewood and Ellesmere Port, Crewe, Burnaston, Noble near Leicester, Aston Martin in Newport Pagnell and finally the IBC van plant in Luton.

Much has changed since then. Production was already suspended at TVR when I visited. Although it restarted briefly afterwards, the factory has since been demolished. Aston no longer makes cars in Newport Pagnell, although the heritage works operation is still busy, and Noble has dropped below our arbitrary 100-a-year threshold.

Several other factories from our first tour have also disappeared, including MG Rover at Longbridge, Jaguar’s Browns Lane factory, Westfield at Kingswinford, Bristol at Filton, Peugeot at Ryton and two van factories, Ford at Southampton and LDV at Washwood Heath.

Yet there has been plenty of good news since 2005 too. JLR’S plants are all massively busier than they were 12 years ago and the expansion of the luxury brands has been spectacular. Bentley has more than doubled its staff and Rolls-royce production has risen eightfold, while Mclaren has come from a standing start to become one of the world’s leading supercar makers.