New car registrations continued to fall in Europe last month with industry leaders blaming a strike by transporter drivers in Italy for the reverse.

Overall, sales returns from the 23 European Union and three EFTA countries totalled 1.29 million in May, a 1.7 per cent decline in comparison with the same month last year.

The downturn meant that markets were 2.4 per down so far this year with total sales of 6.64 million compared with 6.8 million for the first five months of 2004.

Acea, the European carmakers' organisation, said May's figure was "heavily influenced" by a heavy 28 per cent fall in the Italian market caused by a month- long transporter strike which disrupted deliveries of new vehicles.

Apart from Italy, Britain was the only other one of the five main European car markets to go into reverse.

Domestic figures issued by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders in London last week showed a 3.4 per cent fall to 187,900 units in May, the fifth monthly fall in a row.

In contrast, France (up 8.4 per cent), Spain (up 7.1 per cent) and Germany (up 6.2 per cent) showed "encouraging growth", Acea said.

All the other 11 core EU countries showed growth ranging from half a percentage point in Austria to 15 per cent in Denmark.

Among manufacturers, Ford's European figures reflected the differing fortunes of Land Rover and Jaguar.

Land Rover, boosted by the success of the new third generation Discovery and keen interest in the Range Rover Sport, saw its sales increase by five per cent to 6,091 in May although year to date sales were five per cent down at 32,175.

Sales of Jaguars were 32 per cent down on the month at 3,533 and 25 per cent down on the year at 20,176.

The company, which is in the process of shifting production of the flagship XJ saloon and the XK sports car from Coventry to Birmingham, is pinning its hopes of a revival on the new twin turbo diesel variants of the XJ and the X-Type "baby Jag" built at Halewood, Merseyside.

Of the main European car companies, BMW put in the strongest performance last month with a 23 per cent increase to 67,728 and a full percentage point increase in its market share to 5.5 per cent.

BMW ' s Mini brand increased sales by 25 per cent to 10,728, the Acea figures showed.

European market leader Volkswagen Group sold a total of 237,402 vehicles.