NOVICE businessman Neville Corr hopes to live up to his company title, Good as New, after retraining for work at a college for people with disabilities.

Separate muscle and tissue injuries to both hands forced the former HGV driver to give up his job and look to fulfil a long-held ambition of setting up his own business.

The 33-year-old father-of-three was told of the opportunities at Durham's Finchale College, which provides vocational training for disabled people, and gave it a look.

"I enrolled on an accountancy course at first, but then I saw there was a domestic appliance course, and I thought that was more my cup of tea, so I went for it.

"I gave it my best and although I wasn't sure at first, I ended up sailing through it."

Just weeks after achieving his NVQ level 1 and 2 in electrical and electronics servicing, and a portable appliance testing qualification, he became self-employed with the backing of East Durham Development Agency.

Mr Corr, who remembers helping his late father to set up a television repair service in his younger days, is running his business from a former motorists' discount shop unit in Yoden Road, Peterlee.

Good as New, an electrical repair and retail business, is already going from strength to strength, and Mr Corr now employs two people, with the prospect of taking on a third worker if business continues to grow.