Jaguar Land Rover has said some customers in Europe may be boycotting British cars following the UK’s vote to leave the European Union.

Chief executive, Ralf Speth, said on Friday there had been signs some customers in Europe, Jaguar Land Rover’s biggest market, no longer wanted to buy British cars after the Brexit vote.

Speth said JLR would “realign its thinking” on investment after Britain’s vote to leave the EU and if Nissan got a Brexit compensation deal then other automakers would need the same advantages.



When asked about remarks by the chief executive of Nissan, who said on Thursday he would halt new investment in Britain without a pledge of compensation for tariffs imposed on UK-built cars in the event of a hard Brexit, Speth said: “We are the only car manufacturer in the UK to do all the work in terms of research, design, engineering, production planning in the UK. We want to have fair treatment and a level playing field at the end of the day.”

Speth said the firm, which built one-third of Britain’s 1.6m cars last year, would face a double hit in the event of a hard Brexit, with tariffs on exported cars and imported parts and technology from within the bloc hurting competitiveness. He said the company’s long-term strategy on investment had not changed but the firm would now have to think again after Britons backed leaving the EU.

However, Speth left open the possibility of new investment such as an electric battery and car plant in Britain if the conditions, including pilot testing and support from science, were right. “The best thing would be to have something in the UK ... If you are producing batteries there then you will also produce vehicles there,” he said.