Chancellor Angela Merkel risks losing her majority in Germany’s upper house of parliament as the country’s most populous state votes today – a setback that could make it harder to run Europe’s biggest economy.

Vauxhall and Opel are to be taken over by Canadian car parts company Magna, industry sources said tonight.

GERMANY’S biggest political parties reached a deal last night to form a coalition government, sealing an accord that would make Angela Merkel the nation’s first woman chancellor.

A senior conservative’s participation in Germany’s proposed new left-right government was in doubt today as politicians struggled to digest the implications of a sudden leadership crisis in the centre-left Social Democrats.