After a turbulent couple of years, van rental giant Northgate is to buy almost 20,000 new vehicles this year.

This is in addition to the 9,400 new vehicles it purchased up to the end of October 2009

The vehicles will be used to replace almost a third of the existing 61,000-vehicle rental fleet.

The purchase of the 20,000 new vehicles - the majority of which will be Ford, Mercedes-Benz, Peugeot and Volkswagen vans - “reflects our need to replace existing stock and our confidence that we will see some limited growth this year,” said Ross Clarkson Northgate marketing director.