The government has been accused of bungling a bid to lure electric car giant Tesla to Greater Manchester.

It is understood ministers tried to entice the huge American company to set up a huge new manufacturing plant at the ‘Northern Gateway’ site in Heywood.

The 600,000 square metre-plot near the M62 is believed to have been the only UK site of the scale required for Tesla’s purposes.

However, the firm, headed by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, ultimately opted to base its Gigafactory Europe operation in Berlin.

The German city is believed to have always been the frontrunner - with Musk promising to reforest an area three times the size of that which would be lost in constructing the new plant.

(Image: AP)

But those close to efforts to tempt the manufacturer to Heywood say the government’s handling of the situation bordered on the inept - claims a Department for International Trade spokesperson said “we do not recognise".

Rochdale council leader Allen Brett said the borough had missed out on a huge boost to the economy, thousands of highly-skilled jobs and a new source of business rates.

He added: “On the government’s involvement, I’ve not been assured the government has done enough to make this happen. Germany did a lot, and I’m not sure we did the same.

“I think if we had a bit more of a push from the government we might really have got something.”

The Local Democracy Reporting Service understands the Department of International Trade (DIT) worked closely with other departments to identify suitable sites, and spoke directly to leaders in Greater Manchester.

But one source with inside knowledge of the bid has backed up Coun Brett, whose disappointment is understood to be widely shared by local chiefs.

(Image: Google Maps)

They said: “This doesn’t happen all the time and we would have expected DIT to have known how to approach Tesla and put together a support package like they did in Berlin - to know what hoops we need to jump through to get this over the line.

“Obviously there’s a way of approaching these things, it’s not just a case of collating the information and asking what happened.”

Rochdale council is understood to have asked for lots of support from DIT, but felt the department ‘didn’t really perform’ - with the most useful guidance coming from the combined authority and MIDAS - the Greater Manchester investment agency.

Bosses were expecting a consultation on how to present the bid in the right way to Tesla, with top government officials speaking to the council or combined authority.

“But none of that happened, either it was a publicity stunt by the government or they didn’t know what they were doing,” said the anonymous source.

“They had this enquiry and were expecting us to tell them what to do, when it should have been the other way around.

"The government should be telling the city region ‘this is what we should be doing and this is how we should be doing it’.”

However, they believe the interest in the Northern Gateway bodes well for the region’s post-Brexit future.

The source added: “It proved that Greater Manchester has a good track record at attracting investment and that has a lot to do with our approach.

“From what I have seen, that will continue after Brexit and, when trade deals come forward, we will outperform other regions of the country because we are already ahead of the game as a city region, rather than as a country.

“And it proved that the site in Rochdale is the most significant site in the country.”

A Department for International Trade spokesperson said: “We do not recognise these claims. DIT worked hard to present Tesla with a wide selection of sites across the country, one of which was in Greater Manchester.”