In the week that Remploy is due to close, making 65 Fife workers redundant, Gordon Brown has called for a full National Audit Office inquiry.
Mr Brown, with MPs Thomas Docherty and Lindsay Roy, has been campaigning to keep the Cowdenbeath and Leven Remploy factories open, and this week paid tribute to a loyal, dedicated and long serving workforce which had earned the thanks of the whole community in Fife.
He said that after 60 years of service to the community, the Remploy workforce deserved far better treatment than the rush to closure when they were producing a fast-selling product with a worldwide order book.
What Mr Brown disputes and wants investigated are the arrangements made to sell on the factories’ equipment and designs.
The three MPs have claimed a full National Audit Office inquiry is needed because Remploy’s marine textile operations are now being asset-stripped with equipment and designs sold off at rock bottom prices, despite the fact that the product made in Fife had annual orders of 30,000.
The MPs say their attempts to find a new buyer were hampered by deals Remploy had made with their customers over who owned the design patents for their goods.
The MPs will tell the NAO that one local company that was ready to come in to bid to take the factory over found at the last minute that they were hamstrung by a patent for the good they wanted to manufacture being part-owned by someone else.
Paying tribute to the workforce, Mr Brown said: “The employees who worked hard over the years deserve medals for the contribution they have made and it is, therefore, all the more annoying to see the patent and the equipment being sold off at rock bottom prices when the life jacket still has buyers around the world.
“I want to know how Remploy got into a position where it did not own the patent for its own design but had to share the intellectual property with its main customer.
“And I want to know why there were no additional incentives offered to attract further bids for the factories, as it was clear that only Remploy’s main customer could inherit the designs and buy the equipment at rock bottom price.
“One reason we cannot find a buyer is the stranglehold Remploy’s past patent agreements have placed on the options for any prospective buyer.”