The UK has capped its final bottle of HP Sauce, the BBC reports. The classic accompaniment to the Brit bacon sarnie will in future have a distinctly Dutch tang, with production shifting to the Netherlands since the Birmingham operation was "not viable", according to Heinz.

The Aston factory's last shift ended at 6am today after campaigners battled unsuccessfully to prevent the closure. Local businesses launched a "Save Our Sauce" campaign - complete with protests in Birmingham and outside the US embassy in London - while MPs "tried to get HP banned from tables inside the Houses of Parliament as it was no longer 'a symbol of Britishness'."

Production team leader Danny Lloyd, who'd worked at the factory for 18 years, admitted the closure was "like the bottom had fallen out" of fellow workers' world. ®

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