CONSERVATIVE Party leader David Cameron is stepping up his efforts to secure compensation for former staff of the Early's blanket factory in Witney who were left without pensions.

Problems with the company's pension fund meant they were told they would not get any money after the mill shut in 2002.

Some had been making contributions to the fund for more than 40 years.

Witney MP Mr Cameron has spent years pressing the Government to find out whether the former workers can claw back some compensation under the Financial Assistance Scheme.

The FAS offers help to some people who have lost out on their pension because the scheme they were a member of was under-funded when it was wound up and the employer is insolvent or no longer exists.

Mr Cameron is pressing Pensions Minister James Purnell for answers about the case of the Early's workers and is due to meet a number of them to discuss the situation a week on Friday.

He said: "I have asked questions in Parliament and raised it in speeches. These people should be eligible for assistance, as some of them paid into a pension scheme for 30 or 40 years.

"I have got to get to the bottom of it but I wrote to the minister in July and have not had an answer."

In 2004, then Pensions Secretary Andrew Smith, the MP for Oxford East, announced that the FAS, backed with £400m of public money, had been set up to help people like the Early's workers.

It followed pressure from unions and MPs, including Mr Cameron, who were fighting for changes to the Government's Pensions Bill to include backdated protection for up to 60,000 people affected by problems with pension schemes.

Early's mill closed in July 2002, bringing an end to more than 300 years of blanket making in the town. About 70 workers lost their jobs.

Among them was John Brooks, 67, of Westfield Road, Witney, who said: "I paid into a pension for 38 years and nothing came out.

"A group of members are meeting Mr Cameron to push it forward but at the moment we don't know when or if we will get our money."

Former colleague Tony Clapton, 68, of Heath Lane, Bladon, joined Early's when he was 15, and worked there all his life. He reached the retirement age of 65 in June 2003.

He said: "Even if I got out what I paid in without the company's contribution, that would be some- thing."

Mr Clapton had been expecting a lump sum of about £18,000 when he retired, along with a weekly pension payment.

Along with those made redundant in 2002, many other former staff were affected when the company's pension scheme closed in May 2002, two months before the factory closed down and the site was sold for housing.

In May2006, the Government proposed an extension to the coverage of the Financial Assistance Scheme, bringing its total commitment to £2.3bn. It is hoped the extension to cover more pensioners, will be introduced by the end of the year.

A Department for Work and Pensions spokesman said: "We're continuing to work with the trustees of the Early's scheme to establish whether they're in a position to request initial payments."