German states urge support for car industry amid "historic disruption"

FRANKFURT, Sept 17 (Reuters) - Three German regional states that are home to the nation's largest car manufacturers on Thursday urged the government and European Union leaders to speed up support measures as the industry faces "historic disruptions".

Without a better regulatory environment at home and protective trade measures, "the automotive industry is at risk of irreversible damage," the leaders of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria and Lower Saxony said in a joint statement.

• The EU Commission’s anti-subsidy investigations must be extended to plug-in hybrids, they said.

• The EU's proposed Industrial Accelerator Act, designed to support industrial investment, decarbonisation and local manufacturing, must be pursued with both urgency and diligence, they added.

• In the eight-page statement, the leaders also called for steps to lower energy and non-wage labour costs, infrastructure investments as well as bureaucracy cuts.

• EU carbon emission rules should be relaxed, with relief measures needed for e-fuels, hybrid cars and efficient combustion engines as transition technologies, they said.

(Reporting by Ludwig Burger, additional reporting by Andreas Rinke, editing by Thomas Seythal)