ROWS of machines stood silent at Susie Radin, in Crook, last week as their operators filed in for the last time to collect their slim pay packets.

There were photographs, kisses and hugs - but this was no party. Tears of anger and sadness were flowing among the 100 skilled textile workers who were losing the jobs they loved.

With a take home wage of just £129 a week they hardly felt overpaid. How much less, they wonder, must their bosses be paying the far off workers in Hong Kong and China who are taking over their work?

Many of them remember the golden years when Crook was a centre of excellence in the clothing industry.

They were among the 500 machinists who lost their jobs nine years ago at Ramar, along the road, and are facing redundancy for the second time.

With 4,000 clothing jobs lost in the North-East over the last 18 months they have no real prospect of staying in the industry.

One of the few who could, skilled operator Janet Gowland, is so unsure of the future that she won't be taking the machinists job she has been offered at Courtaulds, in Tindale Crescent,

Janet, 37, said: "I have been made redundant twice and I am not going through it again. I don't feel confident that any job in the clothing industry is safe. I loved my job. I loved machining and working here was like working with your family.

"Whatever I do it is never going to be the same. There is no other work around except a few part-time jobs so we will either have to re-train or go on the dole."

Shop steward Louisa Cowan, 63, was angry that the company's senior managers were too busy to travel from London for the final day. Her daughters Julie McGrath and Shirley Turner have also lost their jobs. She said: "It has been very shabby the way we have been treated. They haven't played the game with these girls at all."

A council-led task force is working to soften the blow of the closure which Myles Handy, economic development director for the Wear Valley district, estimates will cost the Crook economy as much as £1/2m