A UNION today voiced concerns over jobs after it was announced that one of Blackburn's biggest factories is to be sold to a German firm.

East Lancashire based industrial group Scapa revealed it was selling off large parts of its business including the Scapa-Scandia site at Cartmell Road in a £329 million deal with Voith.

The Blackburn site employs more than 400 people manufacturing specialist fabrics, including press felts used on paper making machines. Scapa, which has its headquarters on Preston New Road in Blackburn, has said it wants to concentrate on other parts of its business such as its specialist tape division. In recent months the group has been battered by a series of profit warnings blamed on slack demand and the effects of the strong pound on exports.

Last year 75 jobs were lost and senior management axed at the Scapa-Scandia plant.

Peter Reid of the Transport and General Workers union, representing more than 200 workers at Scapa-Scandia said today: "We will be watching the situation very carefully. Any buyouts are always a cause for concern because they often lead to job losses."

Mr Reid said he wanted to speak to Voith to discuss their plans and to seek assurances about the future of the site.

The sale also includes one of Scapa's other businesses in East Lancashire, Scapa Forming, of Stubbins, but will not affect Scapa Filtration, of Haslingden.

As part of today's announcement, Scapa said it was planning to return some of the money made from the sale to shareholders and expected the figure to be around 50p a share. Shares in the firm rocketed on the news. In early trading they were up by 26p to £1.41.

Voith is a privately owned German company which supplies plant and equipment to the paper making industry.

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