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There are 54 Remploy businesses across the United Kingdom employing 2,800 workers in a range of enterprises from furniture making to and operating CCTV systems and control rooms.

In Wales there are nine Remploy factories, largely concentrated in and around the South Wales Valleys, which altogether employ more than 400 workers.

Funding comes from the Department of Work and Pensions which supports Remploy to the tune of some £63 million a year. That works out at around £23,000 a year for every employee.

That arrangement is now under scrutiny after a Government-commissioned review recommended that, "Government funding should be invested in effective support for individuals, rather than subsidising factory businesses."

The review's author is Elizabeth Sayce, chief executive of RADAR - the Royal Association for Disability Rights - who found that there was not enough work to go around Remploy and that around half of factory employees have no work to do.

"It's really difficult when you look at some of the factories that are not doing well financially, because there is a pot of money there that is to support disabled people's employment."

"You do have to question, "Is that the best use of money?", when you could support many more people for the same amount of money in viable businesses."

Elizabeth Sayce's recommendation to ministers is that viable Remploy factories should be encouraged to go it alone, free from Government control, maybe as a workers' co-operative or social enterprise.

Where this is not an option, and businesses cannot continue, Remploy's workers should be offered support to secure alternative employment or training.

It's a prospect that alarms Unite union shop steward Roy Whitney, who has been with Remploy for 28 years and now works in the head office of its furniture division on the Baglan Energy Park in Neath Port Talbot.

With total unemployment close to 2.6 million and youth unemployment heading towards a record high of 1 million, he fears that Remploy workers will lose out if they find themselves on the jobs market.

"I'm 57 years of age. I've got one arm. Who wants to employ a bloke with one arm at 57 years of age? Nobody. So I'm going to be back at the end of the queue and back on benefits. It's going to cost the Government more."

"You are always going to get a certain type of disable people that will never survive in mainstream industry."

But the idea that Government money follows individuals into jobs - through the expansion of schemes such as Access to Work - rather than workers following the money into Remploy factories does have support.

Rhian Davies is the chief executive of the umbrella organisation Disability Wales, which gave evidence to the Sayce review.

"Our society now is much more inclusive and the expectation is that people live in the community and have the support to do that and that should really be the same in employment."

"This isn't an easy solution but we'll never move to disabled people being fully included in society while we sustain segregated places."

Public consultation on the Sayce Report is now closed. The Department of Work and Pensions is beginning to sift through the responses before the minister for disabled people, Maria Miller, makes a final decision.

She has already said she is "attracted" to its recommendations but insists that the consultation is meaningful.

"We need to make sure there is a good mix of support for disabled people to be able to live independent lives in the future. Most disabled people I meet want to get into a job that is rewarding."

"I'm sure there won't be a "one size fits all solution". I can absolutely assure you that until we have gone through all of those responses no final decisions have been taken."