French carmakers will receive a government bailout of up to €6 billion (£5.5 billion) in return for pledging to keep factories in France open, Francois Fillon, the Prime Minister, said today.

Speaking at the start of a car industry summit in Paris, Mr Fillon said the country's manufacturers would be given the help for which they are pleading as sales plummet amid the crisis.

The meeting of manufacturers, unions and suppliers was called by President Sarkozy with car industry executives warning of wide-scale redundancies in an industry which accounts for 10 per cent of French jobs without government backing.

"Our efforts on behalf of manufacturers will be massive," said Mr Fillon. 'What are we talking about? Sums which are in the region of €5 billion or €6 billion."

But the Prime Minister said Renault and Peugeot-Citroen, the Gallic car giants, would need to commit themselves to maintain French jobs and to continue using French suppliers.

"There is no question of the State helping a manufacturer which would purely and simply decide to close one or more plants in France.

"In return, we expect exemplary commitments in terms of the quantity of cars produced in France and in terms of the chain of suppliers."

His comments came after Carlos Ghosn, the chairman of Renault, called for a French version of the US government bailout for its car industry.

He said carmakers were in 'urgent need' of liquidity and help in making credit accessible to their customers.

Mr Ghosn said the industry was facing a 'crisis that is brutal, global and of an exceptional size. We even talk about the great Depression of 1929.'

He urged lower taxes for French-made cars and a tax hike on imported cars, claiming that French vehicles cost on average Euro1000 more than foreign rivals because of French fiscal rules.

In a sign of the turmoil, Renault reported a 28.5 percent drop in vehicle sales in December.

Christian Streiff, the chief executive of Peugeot-Citroen, predicted a 'terribly difficult' year and said he was unsure whether his group would register a profit.

French ministers have yet to give details of the government bailout, although it appears certain to involve help for manufacturers' consumer lending units.

One option is to increase the State's 15 per cent stake in Renault and to take a stake in Peugeot-Citroen.

However, Mr Streiff is resisting a partial nationalisation, telling Le Figaro he wanted to maintain his firm's "independence and freedom of action".

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