Cobber

Yeah with those shitty blue crimp connections they are not original, they’re probably a part of a low coolant alarm and would intercept one of those other wires in the back ground.
If so they’d take the power feed to the low coolant alarm from the feed to the reverse light switch.

The handle escutcheon probably won’t flex but the handle grip most likely will

The tail lights in these things are very vulnerable to damage from items in the boot.
There is an optional solution which should’ve been standard fitting on these cars.

My car is volcano orange a bit of a chromatic/ metallic colour looks great but a very difficult colour to match I plan to get my door handles and mirrors metalised (a chrome coating for plastic)

Painted Plastics are always a problem they are usually painted with a flex aid additive and when so need to be painted separately.
The paint batches are different and will fade at a different rate. And probably weren’t a great colour match to begin with.
The problems that your gonna have with buying off the shelf touch up paint is a good colour match as well as having no flex additive.
The paint will be harder than the plastic it’s on so chips and cracks are a definite likelihood.
You need to go to a proper automotive paint store that supplies the panel shops and get them to mix it for you, take the car in and they can mix it to match, they will use the paint code as a starting point. Do explain that it is the plastic bits that you are painting and they will know if it needs a flex additive.
A good paint mixer with a good eye will get you real close. And will be able to pack your paint in an aerosol can for you.
Don’t wast your time and money at the parts and accessories supermarkets the 12 years olds they employ wouldn’t know their armpit from their arsehole without having a sniff……..even then they’d need a couple of goes to get it right!

Relatively speaking it shouldn’t be too difficult to move the engine enough to get clearance without removing it.
I’mMelbourne based in Burwood so might be able to offer assistance .
I’ll PM you my phone number (you’ll probably have to leave a message as I seldom hear the damned thing ring)

If you wanna [solate from the + side then you need to use remote battery isolator switch like these:



You can even get n electronic version with remote control:

But I'd be wary of this one.....dubious Chinese quality , there may well be some out there made in places where moe care is taken when things are made

Don't ya just love it when some cretin uses house shit on their (now your) car! They're nothing but bloody oxygen thieves! Ya wouldn't pi$$ in their mouth if their throat was on fire.

Are you sure they are originally from an MGF? and not some other car in the MG/Rover range?
I ask because I had a Chrysler Valiant Charger coupe that had a push button in a similar position, which allowed the seat back to tilt forward to allow passenger access to the rear seat, but in the sedans and station wagons which used the same seat the button was deleted as they had no need for the seat to tilt forward.
I'm wondering if MG/Rover did some thing similar and some where in the MG/Rover line up they used a variation of the same seat as the MGF in a 2 door 4 seat model.
Maybe they were short of MGF seats and shoved some from another model in to keep production running.

I don't really know as we only got a fraction of the MG/Rover range here in Oz, mainly MG Fs, TFs, ZTs and Rover 75s with a very small smattering of ZSs and ZRs.
I've never even actually seen any of the last two in the flesh, but have seem 'em advertised for sale on the net.