VW to submit "comprehensive" plan to regulators over emissions scandal

The German car manufacturer acknowledged two weeks ago it had deliberately deceived officials about how much its diesel cars polluted.

In a speech to around 1,000 senior managers on late on Monday, VW’s new chief executive Matthias Mueller outlined the plans which will be submitted to regulators.

The company is under huge pressure to tackle the crisis as Germany's motoring regulator Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt had set a deadline of 7 October for a plan to bring diesel emissions into line with the law.

Reuters reported he said the German car manufacturer will tell its customers “in the next few days” to retrofit affected diesel models and provide technical solutions to authorities in October.

"We are facing a long trudge and a lot of hard work," Mueller said in the speech text seen by Reuters. "We will only be able to make progress in steps and there will be setbacks."

Mueller also said VW's core autos division, which is struggling with high fixed costs and low profit margins, will become as independent as Audi and Porsche going forward.

"The new company structure is a first step and the basis for a modernization of VW, for a new and better company," he said.

Out of the 11m vehicles fitted with the sophisticated software enabling them to cheat emission tests, VW confirmed on Tuesday that 1.8m cars were commercial vehicles following a German newspaper report.