STAFF at a flood-damaged factory in Ryedale have been assured their jobs will be safe until production can resume.

Malton Clothing Ltd in Welham Road, Norton, was forced to shut down after about four feet of floodwater damaged machinery and the building itself.

The factory was saved from closure when it was bought last June by Scunthorpe-based businessman Peter Tasou from previous owner Dewhirst. About 60 of the 90 or so employees are now on paid holiday following the flooding. The remainder are travelling by bus to sister company Driffield Clothing Ltd in order to maintain production of garments for the Arcadia Group, whose stores include Dorothy Perkins and Top Shop.

The factory at Driffield, which also previously belonged to Dewhirst, was bought by the Tasou Group last October.

Darren Muir, Malton Clothing's personnel manager, said: "We're in the same position as everyone else. We're having to wait for the factory to dry out before we can assess the damage properly. We're moving the people that we can over to our Driffield site and trying to carry on production as normally as we can."

Mr Muir said: "What we are trying to do is look after the staff as much as possible because, when we reopen the Malton Clothing factory, we want the workforce to be there for us.

"A lot of investment has gone into the site at Norton and we don't want to lose that," he said. "Even if we can open only part of the Malton Clothing site, we will get them working as early as possible.

"What we don't want is for the employees to lose out at this stage. They have shown a lot of loyalty since the takeover and they have valuable skills."

Mr Muir said dehumidifiers were being used to dry out the Norton factory after the flood. "Fortunately, we are insured for an incident such as this."

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