Nissan Qashqai

Nissan is delivering a shot in the arm to British car manufacturing with the announcement that its new compact SUV will be built at the firm's Sunderland plant.

The Qashqai small SUV will be unveiled at the Paris motor show later this month and should create hundreds of jobs at Nissan's northeast factory.

Production of the Qashqai is expected to begin in December, ahead of the car's launch in February 2007.

There are plans to produce 130,000 models at the Sunderland plant, with much of the production heading to Japan.

A Nissan spokesman told TopGear.com: "This is great news for Britain and Nissan's Sunderland factory. It shows Nissan has the greatest confidence in British car workers."

© Source: original article on topgear.com