Remploy closure leaves staff on scrapheap

Photo: Darren Robinson

HOLDING back the tears . . . workers say goodbye

DISABLED workers were dealt a devastating blow as Oldham’s Remploy factory closed its doors for good yesterday.

Production ground to a halt at the Bardsley plant — which mainly produces windows and doors — at noon, with around 100 workers facing joblessness.

As emotions ran high at the Ashton Road gates, one female worker, said: “I don’t know where my future lies now.”

Peter Williamson, epilepsy sufferer and GMB union representative at the site, said: “This is an upsetting day, with many people feeling like they have been put on the scrapheap.

“This has been a huge kick up the backside for disabled people.

“You have got people who have been working for Remploy for 30 years and don’t know anything else, then you have got the workers who are around 30 years of age and have got another 35 years left to work — that’s who I feel sorry for.”

Half of Remploy’s 54 factories nationwide are set to close by the end of the year. Oldham is the biggest of the factories.

The Government has pushed ahead with plans to close the factories, despite pressure from workers and unions.

A rescue package had been drawn up in an 11th-hour bid to keep Oldham’s Remploy factory alive, back in May, but backers claim government obstacles were put in the way of getting it off the ground.


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