A GWENT factory employing people with disabilities will be helping to fill 80,000 stockings this Christmas by preparing ties which will be bought as gifts.

Remploy, of Abertillery, which employs people with disabilities, is packaging the ties for supermarkets for Christmas.

Its manager Graham Summers said: "We are specialising in automotive work, but welcome the seasonal opportunities Christmas brings.

"We are packaging ties which range from the sedate to the riotous."

Remploy was founded in 1945 to provide employment for disabled people, and remains the UK's largest employer of disabled people.

It has over 80 highly flexible factories located throughout the UK which supply a range of products ranging from high grade industrial clothing, for use by fire services and the military, to electronic applications for mobile telephones and monitoring equipment. It supplies half the firms in the FTSE 100 index.

Customers include Unilever, Ford, Unipart-Jaguar and JCB.

It employs over 6,000 people in its factories, with 4,400 more working for others.

During the year nearly 800 people trained by Remploy progressed into jobs with other employers.

Ninety percent of Remploy's staff are disabled.