WOOL textile workers have tabled demands for a basic wage of £6 an hour.

Hundreds of workers in West Yorkshire are among those seeking an inflation- busting pay rise this year.

Peter Booth, national organiser for manufacturing at the Transport and General Workers' Union, said: "The time has come to reverse years of decline.

"We want to put wool textile workers back on a par with other workers in the textiles, clothing and leather sectors in the UK."

The union is demanding a basic wage of £6 an hour, an extra day's holiday and improved sick pay in its talks with the employers' body, the Bradford-based Confederation of British Wool Textiles.

The lowest-paid workers in the industry receive the national minimum wage rate of £4.85 an hour for adults and £4.10 for 18 to 21-year-olds.

Mr Booth said trading had been tough for textiles in recent years.

But he said there was evidence to show that many firms in the wool industry had fared better than their counterparts in most other textile sectors and orders were improving.