3,000 jobs under threat as blast furnaces set to close,

Crunch talks over electricity switch

- DAVE BURKE and MIKEY SMITH

UNIONS were last night locked in crisis talks to save 3,000 jobs as steel giant Tata prepares to shut blast furnaces at its biggest plant.

The Indian company is understood to have rejected plans aimed at saving jobs in Port Talbot in South Wales in order to switch to electric arc systems.

Government ministers agreed last year to plough £500million into the plant to help fund a transition to cleaner steel production.

But they have been accused of overseeing "managed decline".

Charlotte Brumpton-Childs, GMB trade union national officer, said: "Large-scale job losses would be a crushing blow to Port Talbot and UK manufacturing in general.