BURY clothing and textile companies could ultimately benefit from a new project to tackle an acute skills shortage in the North West's £80 million knitwear sector.

Competitiveness Minister Alan Johnson opened the Centre for Skills Development in Knitwear Manufacturin on Monday (July 10).

The centre, at UMIST's department of textiles, will train people to use high-tech equipment to keep the region at the forefront of textile design and manufacture.

Mr Johnson said: "Machinery put people out of work in the Lancashire textile industry. Now a shortage of skilled people is keepng the machinery idle." He added: "While the knitwear industry is buoyant, a lack of trained personnel means that computer-controlled machines that give the sector its competitive edge are often working at only a third of their capacity.

"This new facility will redress the balance and help to develop a competitive, world class knitwear manufacturing industry by training people at all levels in the programming and use of this new generation of machines."

The centre will provide training and skills development for the latest flat-bed knitting machines and make-up of machines.

Besides upgrading the skills of existing employees, it will target new and potential staff including school leavers, unemployed people and graduates from the textile departments of the region's higher education institutions.

More than 160 companies, many of them small and medium-sized businesses, make up the knitwear sector in the North West, employing some 1,600 people. They have an estimated annual turnover in excess of £80 million.