STEELWORKERS travelled to the Senedd today with their campaign to save jobs at the Tata Steel plant in Port Talbot.

The three steel trade unions — Community, Unite and the GMB — met Welsh Labour Senedd members, who pledged their support to save jobs in Wales and keep one of the two blast furnaces open.

Tata Steel has said it will close both blast furnaces with the loss of 2,800 jobs and ignored trade union plans to save the production of primary steel in Britain, instead building a new electric arc furnace to recycle steel.

GMB Wales’s political officer Tom Hoyles said: “After meeting Senedd members our activists are confident that Welsh Labour understands the issues surrounding the future of steel and steel communities.”

Wales TUC general secretary Shavanah Taj brought the beleaguered steelworkers solidarity from the trade union movement across Wales.

“Steelworkers are getting huge support from the public and the WTUC stands firmly with you,” Ms Taj said.

Unite Wales Trostre branch chairman Richard Thomas said the union had been told that work producing food and drink cans at the Trostre plant in Llanelli would carry on even if it lost steel from Port Talbot.

“They did not say where the steel would come from, but it could only come from abroad, which is hardly the most environmentally friendly way of producing steel,” Mr Thomas said.

Unite regional officer Jason Bartlett warned that if Tata closes both blast furnaces then it will lose skilled workers before the new electric arc furnace is operational.

“You cannot replace that experience and recruit a new workforce from the jobcentre,” Mr Bartlett said.