An Airbus Beluga XL comes in to land at the Airbus wing assembly plant in Broughton. The transporter aircraft has been tested for maintaining resilience in production logistics

Fourteen months ago Airbus was threatening “potentially very harmful decisions” if Britain crashed out of the European Union without a deal. Tom Enders, its chief executive at the time, called ministers’ failure to provide clarity on Brexit “a disgrace”.

A lot can change in a year. The video warning has since been scrubbed from the company’s online platforms.

Under new management, Airbus now believes that it has an “extremely strong” future in Britain. Its sprawling site in Broughton, north Wales, run by Paul McKinlay, is on track to manufacture about 800 pairs of wings this year, but executives are looking much further down the line.

“Airbus needs the UK and the UK needs Airbus as well,” said Mr McKinlay, who oversees wing production across the