Discover what's caused a stink at Nissan as company claims '˜hoax'

A worker at the plant circulated a picture on-line claiming to have resorted to extreme measures during the course of his shift, by leaving human waste in a car.

When contacted by the Echo, a Nissan spokesman insisted the firm were treating the matter as “a malicious hoax”.

“We are treating this incident as a malicious hoax in which an unknown person has placed an item inside a body shell on our production line and shared a photograph through social media,” he said.

“This seriously misrepresents the high standards of quality and workmanship in place throughout Nissan and our 6,800 employees in Sunderland.”

Plant workers were soon sharing the picture on-line and joking about what the possible outcome might be for the person responsible.

One former worker said: “Proper dirty protest that like.”

Nissan manufactures the Qashqai and the all-electric Leaf on Line 1, on a three-shift basis.

The firm recently announced plans to plough more than £20million into its Sunderland plant to help cope with demand for its most popular model by building Qashqai on the second line.

Engineers will modify Line 2 in a £22milion project which will allow the Sunderland plant to build up to 40,000 more of the pioneering crossover.

Line 2 currently produces the Juke, Note and Infiniti Q30 premium compact, and will still operate on a two-shift basis. Qashqai recently became the highest-volume model in the plant’s history.