Hopes rise for GM's Ellesmere factory Hopes have been raised for the future of General Motors" plant in Ellesmere Port, England, after a labour leader said that the next generation of the carmaker's flagship Astra model would be made there and in Poland. GM is drafting a new business plan to stem losses at its European Opel/Vauxhall business, which it says will be ready before the summer. Its UK employees had been waiting for word on where the US carmaker will produce the next model of the Astra - its best-selling car and Ellesmere Port's sole product - which is up for replacement in 2015. Wolfgang Schäfer-Klug, who heads Opel's works council, said on Monday that GM only planned to make the new Astra in Ellesmere Port and at its plant in Gliwice, Poland. Opel's management, he said, was considering halting production of the car at Opel's mother plant in Rűsselsheim, Germany, and that this would be a "disastrous mistake." "The works council in Rűsselsheim rejects any plan by management to produce the Astra only at two sites," Mr Schäfer-Klug said in a statement. Opel produced 328,900 units of the compact car last year. Rűsselsheim had the smallest output of the model of any of the three sites where GM makes it, producing 18,300 Astras in 2011. GM has been consulting with workers on a new business plan for Europe, which it has hinted could involve more job cuts and plant closures to restore Opel to profitability. GM last week posted a first-quarter operating loss of $356m in Europe. Work on the plan is being led by Steve Girsky, GM's vice-chairman and Opel's chairman. The carmaker's current agreements with its workers from a previous restructuring plan bar it from making any such cuts before 2014. Opel said on Monday only that it had been discussing its plans with its European employees" forum. "Once that consultation process is over, we will make a decision about the next generation Astra," it said. Earlier this year, GM executives said that Opel/Vauxhall's plants in Ellesmere Port and Bochum, Germany, were most at threat of closure as the carmaker looks to cut its losses on Europe's declining market. However, Vince Cable, Britain's business secretary, held talks with Mr Girsky and Dan Akerson, GM's chief executive, after the Ellesmere Port plant's future came into question earlier this year. The UK government has indicated its willingness to support bringing the new Astra to Ellesmere Port in the form of grants for things such as training, as it did with the previous model, said a person with knowledge of the talks. Employees at the factory, which employs about 2,700 people including contractors, have also promised measures to make the plant more flexible in an attempt to draw the new model to Ellesmere Port. Opel's management hinted on Monday that it was seeking similar pledges on flexibility from Opel's German unions. It described the Rűsselsheim plant as "one of our most modern sites from which we expect further improvements in efficiency, which would lead to additional investments." The factory's main model is the midsize Insignia car, which is sold in the US as the Buick Regal.