The 5,500 Vauxhaull workers caught up in America's biggest industrial bankruptcy face a wait of up to three months to learn whether they will be keeping their jobs.

A spokesman for General Motors Europe said that workers at Vauxhaull's factories in Luton and Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, as well as those working for the Opel brand in Germany, "could face a wait of three months".

He said: "There is no specific timeline but there will be no decision until we get a definite agreement [from the new owners]."

Magna International, the Canadian car parts maker, is set to take control of GM Europe, which owns the Vauxhall and Opel brands, in partnership with Sberbank, Russia's biggest state-controlled lender.

An interim deal should be signed in July but no final agreement is expected until September, according to GM Europe.

The new owners have begun picking over Vauxhall’s factories in Luton and Ellesmere Port in an effort to decide what to keep and what to shut down.

The two companies are likely to demand substantial cost savings.

Uncertainty among British vehicle workers was mirrored on the other side of the Atlantic as GM, one of the largest companies in the world, declared bankruptcy.

The failure of GM was a seismic event in the business community because the company has been an industrial mainstay for more than a century.

For 77 years, until 2007, GM was the world’s largest manufacturer of cars and, before its break-up, the company employed nearly a quarter of a million people.

GM, which owns brands such as Buick, Cadillac and Chevrolet, will be placed in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and will be restructured.

The US Government is expected to take a 60 per cent stake.

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