Firms on the brink

HAPPIER times . . . Clive Drinkwater and Nick Baird, of UK Trade and Investment, visited Sellers Engineering bosses Clive Gallagher and Gary Birney

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TWO large Chadderton firms face an uncertain future amid troubling claims from workers.

Staff at Greenbooth Construction were marched off the premises as management told devastated employees trading had “ceased”.

And workers at Sellers Engineering Ltd claim not to have been paid for two weeks amid reports the firm is in administration.

Only 16 months ago Sellers was praised by business chiefs as one of Greater Manchester’s export success stories.

Calls from anonymous workers to the Chronicle have revealed the hardships of both long-lived companies.

Management from both firms failed to respond to numerous requests for information.

One employee from Greenbooth, a civil engineering and building contractor, said: “There were people laid off last year, but there was no inkling this was going to happen.”

Over the past 45 years the Hunt Lane-based firm has forged strong relations with councils across Greater Manchester — including Oldham, for whom contracts worth hundreds of thousands of pounds have been undertaken

According to staff, bosses at Sellers have ordered an administrator to take over the running of the company.

One man told the Chronicle: “I used to work there. (Staff) have told me the company has opted for voluntary liquidation, and that the staff haven’t been paid for weeks.

The Chadderton based-firm has been around since 1975, manufacturing waste and recycling products including bins and skips.