A STRIKE over pay has been avoided after "long and hard" negotiations at a factory.
A narrow majority of Transport and General Workers' Union members at Schmitz Cargobull factory, at Harelaw Industrial Estate, near Stanley, County Durham, voted to accept a revised offer yesterday evening.
Bosses at the factory, which makes refrigerated trailers for food-carrying articulated lorries, had offered a 3.7 per cent pay increase, but the workers wanted a 15 per cent improvement.
Details of the new deal were kept under wraps by the union and management last night.
Union official Joe Keith said long and hard bargaining had begun at 7.30am, and continued almost to the end of the day.
Financial director Colin Davison said the matter was resolved. He said the company had received orders which secured its future.
In February, the firm was forced to lay off 50 staff.
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