Cumbrian Seafoods is closing its Maryport factory permanently with an undisclosed number of job losses.

The company has confirmed that the factory on the Solway Industrial Estate, which has been temporarily closed since November, would not reopen because the recession had led to a downturn in orders.

A spokesman said that most employees were expected to relocate to the company’s other West Cumbria sites, Grants in Maryport and a Whitehaven factory, but there were likely to be some redundancies.

She said: “The company regrets having to make this decision but the general economic conditions have made it inevitable. The company will review the future of the site in due course.”

The spokesman said the company would remain one of the area’s largest private employers.

Thirty jobs were lost when the factory closed in November but bosses then said it could reopen this year.

The latest expected redundancies are among a series of job cuts the factory has made over the past two years, angering some people who accused company boss Peter Vassallo of abandoning the town after grants ran out.

In September last year the company announced it could axe up to 70 jobs. In April the previous year up to 105 jobs were being reviewed.

The redundancies started after the company announced that it was moving a large part of its operations to a new factory in Seaham in County Durham.

Bosses blamed a shortage of available workers in Maryport and a lack of space to expand and Mr Vassallo, in a rare interview last year, stressed he was still committed to West Cumbria through Grants and the Whitehaven factory.

The company would not confirm how many jobs had been lost or how many people were employed when the closure was announced.

It was once the biggest employer in Maryport, with about 300 staff, and was responsible for an influx of Eastern European workers, many of whom have now returned home or joined Mr Vassallo’s new factory in Seaham in the North East.

On the nearby Glasson Estate the family-owned Brookside fish firm is hiring extra workers.

Staff recruitment for a new Dunelm Mill store in Workington will begin next week.

Recruitment open days will be held at the Waverley Hotel, Gordon Street, on Wednesday, from 9am to 6pm, and Thursday, from 9am to 3pm.

Company spokesman Louise Barltrop said the store, on Derwent Drive Retail Park, was expected to open in April and would employ 70-80 people from managers to general shop workers.