DISABLED workers in Glasgow today joined the first national strike taken by staff at Remploy factories across the UK.

They want to show their solidarity for colleagues who have been told their plants are to be axed as part of multi-million pound cost cuts by the Westminster government.

Remploy, which aims to provide people with disabilities with employment, has 54 sites across the country – and unions predicted all would be crippled by industrial action. Workers were due to picket the Springburn factory in Edgefauld Road.

The strike is the latest in a bitter battle by the Unite and GMB unions to try to keep open 27 axe-threatened factories, which includes a plant in Wishaw, North Lanarkshire, which employs 22 disabled staff. Staff at 18 other sites have been told their jobs are safe.

Another nine sites could be reprieved after it was revealed last week that at least one potential buyer from the private sector was in talks about a takeover. One of the sites is Springburn, which employs almost 50 staff.

The factory's GMB works convener Phil Brannan said: "We're on strike because we're fighting to keep the factory within Remploy."

GMB's national secretary Phil Davies added: "This decision to force the closure of Remploy means thousands of disabled people and their families will be put into poverty."

Government ministers claim the factories earmarked for the axe are loss makers and cost taxpayers millions of pounds a year. A Remploy spokesman said: "We are concerned industrial action could deter future buyers."

gordon.thomson@ eveningtimes.co.uk