COMPANY bosses have been accused of putting profits before compassion after telling staff to ignore the three-minute silence in memory of the victims of New York.

As towns and cities around the world fell silent, with up to one billion people thought to have observed the tribute, staff were told to man the phones at the Express Gifts call centre, in Clayton-le-Moors.

A spokesman said today that the telephone system was not shut down at the call centre, which employs 180 people from across East Lancashire, despite staff requests.

He said the decision was taken because customers might have forgotten about the tribute and been trying to get through at 11am on Friday.

The East Lancashire Chamber of Commerce said it believed the call centre was the only business in the area that had not taken part in the silence.

No official guidance was given out by the organisation on how to observe the tribute although a spokesman said it was a matter for the company. She would not comment further.

Tearful staff at the catalogue company, which employs more than a 1,000 people in total and has a huge warehouse in Accrington, contacted the Lancashire Evening Telegraph to tell of their anger at missing out.

One, from Blackburn, said she worked with people from Burnley, Accrington, Ribble Valley and across East Lancashire, said: "I don't know how they could do this.

"Many of us wanted to observe it but they never turned the telephones off. It was awful, this is the biggest disaster we have ever seen and we wanted to remember the dead. Some of us just took part in it anyway and ignored our phones."

A spokesman for Express Gifts said: "Considerable thought went into whether the call centre should be closed, but it was decided to keep it going because obviously some customers might have forgotten about the three-minute silence and some might even not have wanted to observe it.

"There were no complaints from staff at the time. The rest of the company closed down."

Hyndburn MP Greg Pope, whose daughter Roison was caught up in the chaos whilst sight-seeing in New York when the attacks took place, said that the whole world took part in the moving tribute.

He said: "I think it is regrettable that this company did not join the other workers in the UK and observe the three minute silence. "

And Hyndburn councillor Tim O'Kane, who represents Clayton-le-Moors, said he was disgusted.

He said: "I take a dim view of any company that puts profit before compassion, especially when the rest of Europe and indeed the world was showing solidarity.

Other call centre companies in the area observed the silence.

Elizabeth Beasley, in the human resources department at the Holiday Cottage Company, in Earby, which has more than 300 employees in its call centre, said their switchboard was turned off for the three minutes.

She said: "We felt that it was necessary to do. We never thought about the business side of things."

Blackburn with Darwen Council, which has in excess of 7,000 employees, also took part as did every fire station within Lancashire.

And the Great Universal Stores company, which has a catalogue call centre in Burnley, said its switchboard was turned off so the 100 plus employees could take part.

Nationally, huge call centres -- such as the AA and the RAC -- closed its switchboards except for emergency calls.

A spokesman for the RAC said: "All in all we have 15 call centres in the country employing about 1,500 people. We took part in because it was a fitting tribute."

The AA said: "Our three call centres employ hundreds of people and the operation closed so employees could take part."

The American Embassy in London declined to comment because "we would not get involved in something like this." FROM PAGE 1