Mill workers seeking pension cash

Many of their workers lost their jobs at the firm last November

About 1,000 former employees who worked at an Aberdeen textile mill which went bust could lose out on pension compensation due to a technicality.

The problem has been caused because the pension scheme for Richards Textiles went into receivership before the company finally did last November.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has a scheme in place to bail out the pension funds of bust firms.

Richards staff are lobbying to be included in any compensation pay-out.

Consultation is still ongoing to find who will be eligible for money under the department's Financial Assistance Scheme with ministers expected to announce details some time this year.

Pension benefits

The DWP has ring-fenced £400m under the scheme to provide for those who lost their pensions when their companies collapsed.

The Richards workers are now putting pressure on the department to include them when it announces the details of who will benefit under the scheme.

A number of those affected paid into the company scheme for as many as 30 years before it collapsed.

Liquidators were called in in November following a series of financial disasters at the 200-year-old company.

Many of the staff only learned they had been laid off when they realised their wages had not been paid into their bank accounts.

The struggling company had previously been saved from receivership in 2002 after local businessman Ian Suttie led a buyout.