MINISTERS have approved plans to axe dozens of jobs for disabled workers in Kent.

Remploy, the country’s biggest employer of disabled staff, asked the Government to allow the merger of 11 factories and the closure of 32, including one in Rochester.

Work and pensions Secretary Peter Hain announced his backing for the move on Thursday.

The decision will mean more than 60 people based at the site on Rochester Airport Industrial Estate will have to find work elsewhere.

The factory carries out small-scale manufacturing work and, according to bosses, is losing more than £1.1 million a year.

While Remploy chiefs insist there will be no compulsory redundancies, unions are unhappy about the plans.

GMB union general secretary Paul Kenny said he understood changes needed to be made but wanted to safeguard the future of Remploy by making savings without job cuts.

He said: “There is massive scope to trim costs by rationalisation, better methods of procurement and improved working practices.”

But Remploy chief executive Bob Warner said: “The unions have peddled the line that we are proposing to sack disabled people. As they well know we, and the Government, have guaranteed that no disabled employee will be made compulsorily redundant.

“We are convinced that the carefully-costed proposal we submitted to the secretary of state this week, which incorporates many of the union’s suggestions, is the best way to secure Remploy’s future.”

It is thought the Rochester site could be turned into a recruitment centre. Bosses say replacing the factory with a recruitment office will enable Remploy to find jobs for up to 150 disabled people in Medway by 2012.