DIRECTORS of Remploy received more than £1.7m in bonuses in the same year as 2,500 workers lost their jobs, it was claimed yesterday.

The Government-owned company, which employs disabled people, closed 28 factories in 2007, including ones in Stockton, Hartlepool and York, leaving 350 people in the region without work.

Yesterday, the GMB union revealed that directors of Remploy were paid more than £1.7m in bonuses in 2007-8, an increase of 40 per cent.

Speaking at the annual GMB conference in Blackpool, national officer Phil Davies said: “This is an absolute outrage and a misuse of public money.

“It is time to see an end to the bonus culture for the directors in Remploy and spend the money giving employment to disabled workers as was intended.

“These huge bonus payments obviously reflected the way that Remploy was going.”

Mr Davies said managers and directors paid themselves £4,168,598 in bonuses during the three years of crisis and closures, between 2005 and last year.

He said: “That must make the disabled workers who lost their jobs feel warm inside £1.7m knowing at least the managers and directors did okay.”

In September 2007, ministers announced a £555m package intended to safeguard the future of Remploy.

The original plan was to close 43 of the company’s sites, but after talks with unions, Remploy submitted final proposals to the Government that included the closure of 28 factories. The move provoked anger among staff, unions and campaigners and led to industrial action.

Last night, a North-East MP who has campaigned on behalf of workers branded the payouts a disgrace.

Frank Cook, MP for Stockton North, led a Commons debate on the Remploy closures and met managers to try to seek assurances that affected employees would be found other jobs.

He said: “This revelation about their bonuses is a disgrace.

They are deliberately undermining the whole purpose of the organisation.

“They are working for the good of their own pockets and have been derelict of their duty. I do not think I am in a position to ask them to pay the money back, but the climate is one that would demand that they pay it back.”

A spokesman for Remploy said bonus payments were based on performance-related targets.

He said: “Last year’s bonus payments reflect the effort and commitment of Remploy staff as the company went through the biggest transformation in its history.

“As a result of that modernisation programme, Remploy will, by 2012, be finding jobs in mainstream employment for 20,000 people with disabilities and health conditions every year, four times higher than prior to modernisation.”