FEARS of significant job losses at one of Airbus’s British plants were growing this weekend amid mounting speculation that it would be sold to an American group, Spirit Aerosystems.

Spirit is vying with GKN, the UK engineering group, to be chosen as the “strategic investor” for part of Airbus’s complex at Filton, near Bristol.

Senior industry sources said last night that Spirit was edging ahead, with an announcement from EADS, Airbus’s parent company, expected by the end of the year.

The industry sources said union leaders had been told that up to 600 of the 1,500 staff could be made redundant if Spirit were to win. Separate union sources also said some wing work on Airbus’s planned new plane, the A350, could move to a Spirit plant in America.

A move would break the monopoly that Britain has had on Airbus wing production since the European plane maker was set up more than 30 years ago. It would also pose serious questions over the long-term future of the UK civil-aerospace industry, in which Airbus has been the flagship enterprise for some years.

Airbus yesterday declined to comment. “We will not be saying anything ahead of the announcement,” a spokesman said.

Britain no longer has any direct ownership in Airbus. BAE Systems, a long-term shareholder, sold its 20% stake last year for €2.75 billion (£1.9 billion), leaving EADS, a Franco-German aerospace and defence group, as the sole owner.

After the BAE sale, the government sought to retain influence by calling for the appointment of nonexecutive directors to EADS’s board, and by hinting that it might withhold defence contracts if the Airbus plants were not protected.

Two nonexecutive directors were appointed this year – Lakshmi Mittal, the steel tycoon, and Sir John Parker, the veteran British industrialist.

The Filton sale is part of a wider cost-cutting plan first announced last year. Airbus is seeking “strategic investors” for several of its European plants.

Further cost cuts cannot be ruled out. Airbus chief executive Tom Enders recently warned of the severe danger posed to the company by the weakening dollar.

Spirit has grown rapidly to become one of the world’s leading aerostructures companies. It has taken over Boeing plants in America after processes similar to the current Airbus sale.

Its largest UK presence is in Prest-wick, Scotland, where it bought the BAE Systems aerostructures business last year. Defence officials have held exploratory talks with Saudi Arabia about the sale of two of the Royal Navy’s new Type 45 frigates, the first of which was launched last year. The proposal would see the kingdom take two of the six ships currently under construction, with the Ministry of Defence ordering two more to be built later.

The deal would take pressure off Britain’s overstretched defence budget, but industry sources said last night that, although talks would continue, the agreement now appeared unlikely to come to fruition.

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