THE future is looking bright for nine men who were made redundant from Corus last year.

Thanks to Stockton Warm Zone they are being retrained for careers in the gas industry and have begun an intensive training programme at Redcar and Cleveland College.

Beccy Brown, director of Stockton Warm Zone, said: "We identified that work in the Warm Zone will generate a significant increase in the demand for qualified gas engineers and, in particular, people who are qualified to carry out central heating installation work.

"The workers who were made redundant from Corus seemed ideal to retrain as they had been working in a similar industry and many of them were highly skilled."

The 24-week course provides trainees with the knowledge and skills required to carry out safely the installation of central heating systems to industry standards, and develop the skills of the former Corus staff to a gas industry level two NVQ.

All nine will be placed with local installation companies and will eventually go on to secure full-time work with them when their training is completed.