BOLTON'S troubled textile industry has suffered another blow with a Horwich firm announcing the loss of 39 jobs.

Chortex, which supplies luxury towels and has a 188-strong workforce, has blamed the redundancies on a slump of sales in America.

A 30-day consultation period has begun and the redundancies will not come into force until January 3. Ron Steedman,regional organiser for the GMB union in Lancashire, said: "The workers are devastated to be losing their jobs so close to Christmas.

"These latest job losses are a continuation in the decline of the textile industry in the North-west."

Mr Steedman said that Chortex, based in Chorley New Road, stood to lose half of its business from America, because its customers there were buying cheaper goods from elsewhere.

He said that 40 per cent of the firm's business was from America.

Mr Steadman added that 30,000 jobs had been lost in the North-west textile industry in the last three to four years.

In Bolton last year, 200 people lost their jobs when CV Home Furnishings closed their factories in Farnworth and Bradley Fold, 160 jobs were shed at Shiloh Spinners, 90 jobs went at the Cawdor Street Mill, and Westhoughton's only remaining textile firm, Ames Europe Ltd, cut 47 jobs.

Bosses at Chortex declined to comment.