A BICESTER mum is considering selling her Vauxhall Zafira people carrier after other families told how their Zafiras burst into flames.

Mum-of-two Ema Gaul, 33, lives with partner Adam Cooke, and their two sons Seann, nine, and Logan, two, in Upper Heyford.

She and Mr Cooke bought a 1.9-litre 2008 Zafira for about £6,000 six months ago.

But now she fears they may have to sell the vehicle as the heater has started to malfunction and she is concerned there may be a connection with fires that have affected Zafiras made between 2005 and 2014.

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Ms Gaul said: “Recently the heater on the car stopped working properly and wouldn’t come on every time I turned it on so I took the car to the garage to get it fixed but it took them a little while to get the parts.

“They now have the right parts to fix the heater but this has made me worried about other Zafiras which have caught fire.

“I don’t want to sell my Zafira because it has been a reliable family car but if the heating problems continue then I will have to consider selling it – I won’t have a choice.

“My son Seann knows how to get out of the car quite quickly but Logan is only two and is strapped in to a five-point harness so it would take a bit longer to get him out.

“I wouldn’t have known of the problems if I hadn’t seen a Facebook page set up by other mums.

“There must be lots of Zafira owners in Oxfordshire and I think they should be aware of the potential problems.

“I believe Vauxhall are saying at the moment only use the heater if you are de-misting windows, which isn’t ideal when winter is coming up.”

Vauxhall, owned by General Motors, first learned of the problems in August when it was told of 25 cases of cars catching fire.

Vauxhall’s chairman Rory Harvey has pledged to write to owners of Zafira Bs using information supplied by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency urging them to take their car to a local dealer to be checked.

The company said it was taking the issue “very seriously” and Mr Harvey said its investigations of 5,000 vehicles so far had shown evidence of improper repairs.

He added: “Our investigations have found”evidence of improper repair of the blower motor resistor and its thermal fuse which is designed to protect the blower motor system”.

He added: “At this stage further analysis is ongoing to establish the root cause of the fires.”

Mr Harvey said that Zafira B models with no history of air conditioning failure and which had no repairs carried out were at no risk.

Vauxhall began contacting customers on Thursday.