Brussels, 23/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - The Commission has opened formal examination procedure concerning regional aid for a total of £10 million (around EUR 16.2 million), that the United Kingdom plans to grant to Vauxhall Motors Ltd. Notified by the British authorities in August 2001, the project provides for aid to be allocated in favour of investment in Ellesmere Port, in Cheshire. It will be used to modernise an automobile assembly plant belonging to Vauxhall Motors, in the aim of changing it from a single model production installation to a two-model construction installation (namely Astra and the new Vectra model). Total investment could benefit from aid amounting to £156.198 million, with the intensity of aid notified being 6.4%. The Ellesmere Port plant is located in a regionally assisted area with a regional ceiling of 15% net grant equivalent. The United Kingdom states that the project would safeguard 771 jobs at Vauxhall Motors and create approximately 530 jobs in the supply chain. To demonstrate the need for aid, General Motors Europe, Vauxhall's parent company, said it had envisaged two sites for the project, namely Ellesmere Port and the Antwerp plant in Belgium. The Commission is not satisfied with information provided by the United Kingdom which, it considers, does not demonstrate that aid is conform to the rules in force. It mainly has doubts about the "proportionality" of aid, as shown by the results of the cost-benefit analysis.