A COMPANY controlled by the trustees of the late Jack Walker has closed down with the loss of more than 70 jobs.

Workers arrived at car component supplier B Robinson & Co to be told that that they no longer had a job at the firm, which has been in Blackburn for more than 100 years.

The chairman of the company is Howard Walker, the son of the man whose money helped Blackburn Rovers win football's Premier League.

No one from the Walker family trust fund was available for comment today but Matthew Bye, a director of B Robinson & Co, confirmed the firm had closed down its site in Kenyon Street.

He said 53 people had been made redundant with immediate effect and that the remaining 20 staff would go after the company had wound down in what he described as "an organised fashion".

Mr Bye said the company -- that supplied companies such as Ford, Saab, Volkswagen, Toyota, Honda, Vauxhall and Bentley -- had experienced difficult market conditions for a considerable period of time and had been making losses for a number of years. The whole of the UK automotive industry has been suffering from over-capacity and the strength of sterling and we have been caught up in that," he said.

"Despite the efforts of the management and the workforce, it has not been possible to continue. It was our intention to sell the business, but that has not been possible."

Mr Bye said staff made redundant would receive their "full entitlement" and assured creditors they would be paid in full.

The company was part of Jack Walker's business empire and was part of the estate handed over to his trustees following his death in 2000.

Workers at the factory were shocked by the announcement. "We had not expected anything like this at all," said one man who had worked at B Robinson & Co for the past 18 years.

"The main doors to the factory were closed but we were shown to the canteen where we were given the news. We were told the company could not compete with countries where labour costs were lower."

B Robinson & Co, founded in 1892, had been contracting in size in recent years.

The company manufactured pressings and assemblies for the automotive industry and was a key supplier to most of the world's biggest car companies.