The UK government has ruled out a taxpayer-funded bailout for Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), as the carmaker prepares to cut up to 4,000 jobs, around 12% of its 34,000-strong UK workforce. Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds said it was not his role to "intervene and run businesses", ahead of crunch talks on Tuesday between JLR, unions and government officials. The situation poses an early test for Andy Burnham's pledge to "reindustrialise" Britain, given JLR's scale as the UK's biggest carmaker.

JLR, owned by Tata Motors, told staff on Friday to expect a voluntary redundancy programme as part of £1.7bn in cuts over two years, with compulsory job losses possible and further details due as soon as Monday. The cuts, expected to hit management and R&D roles more than production workers, follow a slump in sales worsened by last year's cyber-attack and Donald Trump's tariffs on British car exports. Unite's Sharon Graham is expected to press Reynolds and JLR boss PB Balaji to favour retraining or voluntary redundancy over compulsory cuts, while Reynolds left open the possibility of relaxing 2030 zero-emission vehicle sales targets and said the government could still invest "alongside" industry, as it did with £500m for Tata's Port Talbot steelworks.