A standoff has developed in Tayside between a business and its former employees.
Staff at a Dundee factory are staging a sit-in protest after they were made redundant.
Twelve employees lost their jobs when Prisme Packaging closed its doors on Wednesday. Prisme found itself in difficulty after losing a major contract to supply packaging to whisky company the Edrington Group.
Workers received letters detailing their severance entitlements, but they were also told that the company had no money to honour redundancy payments.
Shocked staff said they had been left with no alternative but to occupy the Tannadice Street factory.
Matthew Duffield explained what the company told him and his colleagues: "It acknowledged what we would do as in statutory redundancies. It was all worked out specifically for each employee and also holiday pay, pay in lieu, all that kind of thing.
"And then there was a line underneath that said 'unfortunately the company does not have any money, so we won't be able to pay you this'. And obviously we're not happy with that, which is why we find ourselves in the current situation."
Another former employee, David Taylor, said staff were told to leave the factory by 5pm on Wednesday.
He said: "Obviously we're quite upset about that. We've been unfairly treated and we're getting told we're not getting any redundancy or anything like that, so it's just a case of us fighting for our rights."
A handful of the 12 employees remained in the factory.
No one from the firm could be contacted for comment.
The staff said they are consulting their lawyers as they consider taking the firm to an industrial tribunal.
Last updated: 05 March 2009, 19:19
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