Ok, so after I worked out it was an HTML browser issue and not a javascript grid issue I solved it with render. Does this look like the right way to solve it...
render: function(ui) {
var strPartName = ui.cellData;
strPartName = strPartName.replace(/</g, "<");
strPartName = strPartName.replace(/>/g, ">");
return strPartName;
}
Thanks and regards
Tony