Port Talbot: Uncertainty remains over steel town’s future

“We have the beach, we have the mountains, however the steelworks is our identity – we are the steel town.”

Gabriella Jukes’ grandfather, uncles and cousins have all worked in Port Talbot’s steel plant, which on Monday will see the second of its two blast furnaces shut down – ending traditional steelmaking in south Wales.

The former Miss Wales said she was proud of the town’s industrial history, but shares the community’s concern about its future.

“My cousin, he’s still really young. He left school thinking he was going to have a job for life there. You don’t know what the plans are for those who have got young families already, it’s just so uncertain,” she said.

Her grandfather, Kenneth Phillips, said it had always been a comfort to see the blast furnaces because “you realise your children are working, they’ve got a job”.