By Phil Upton

Copyright bbc

Work at JLR’s three UK facilities in the West Midlands and Merseyside was halted on 1 September.

The BBC has understood manufacturing will resume first at the engine facility in Wolverhampton on 6 October, while production at other plants will have a phased return.

Mr Crane said JLR would start paying “their tier one suppliers”, but how “the ones below those tiers get paid is a little bit more difficult to pick out.”

He added: “That 1.5 billion is great… We probably need more and… need it quickly.”

Coventry-based Evtec Automotive, which employs about 600 people, said it had probably laid off about 500 to date.

Chairman David Roberts stated: “We’re paying them on 80% of their normal pay.

“That’s coming out of our cash flow, obviously.”

Asked whether the government acted quickly enough, he replied: “I’m slightly underwhelmed by the government’s response to how they handled it.

“If the UK wants to have advanced manufacturing capability, if it wants 200,000 people who are employed in the industry to carry on, it’s really got to come through a little bit… quicker and more agile to support the supply chain.”

Mr Roberts also said the majority of “the tier ones really know their supply chain, so there’ll be very strong at making sure that tier two, tier three is supported”.

Business Secretary Peter Kyle has previously said the loan guarantee would help protect jobs in the West Midlands, Merseyside and elsewhere in the JLR supply chain.

“We are offering a £1.5bn credit facility to JLR with the explicit intention that that is to support the supply chain into JLR as well,” he said.

“This is a big moment, this will offer an enormous resource for JLR and the supply chain to get through the immediate challenges that they face.”