Smeared in soot, 18-year-old Hopkins said after his shift at the British Steel plant: "I shovel and all that lot, it's amazing. It's hard work but it makes your day go faster... when you get your paycheck."
However, he added that it was "quite a dramatic time to start working here, I'm having people message me going 'the job might be getting taken off you'."
The plant in northeast England is the last in the UK to produce virgin steel used in construction and rail transport.
Its future was thrown into jeopardy in March when Chinese owner Jingye said the plant was losing GBP 700,000 ($923,000) a day and was "no longer financially sustainable".
It rejected a bailout deal with the UK government, which this weekend secured emergency legislation giving it control over the site in order to keep the blast furnaces burning.
A long-term solution has yet to be agreed, leaving the plant's 2,700 workers in limbo.
- 'Sad end' -
Steel has dominated the Lincolnshire town since the 19th century, with the plant's chimneys towering over low-rise houses.
"Physically, you can see it, the town's surrounded by the works," explained 52-year-old dog walker Chris Cell.
The plant also dominates the local economy.
"That steel works is our lifeline. If you cut the artery, things run out, you end up with nothing," former steelworker Jim Kirk, 66, told AFP outside a shop on Scunthorpe's high street.
"If that steel works closes, that'll be the end of Scunthorpe. Nobody's going to want to live here. It just comes to a sad end ... And it shouldn't be like that," added Kirk, who worked in the industry for 35 years, from the age of 16, until a bout of meningitis left him blind.
"Everyone in Scunthorpe knows somebody that's affiliated to the steel works," said consultant radiographer Nick Barlow, 36.
"It's how the town was formed, everything revolves around it and everyone's worried," he added.
The plant's closure would deal a devastating blow to an already struggling town centre, warned card shop worker Joanne Cooper, 57.
"The mood in town, morale is very low. People seem to have no hope. More shops are closing, and if British Steel goes, it'll be even worse for the town, it's pretty dead already.
"There won't be a high street. I think it'll just become a ghost town. It means everything to the town for British Steel to stay open," she added.
A poster reading "Save our Steel" covers the front door of her shop, but only for a few more days as the business is due to close down next week, crippled by rising rents.
- Nationalisation hopes -
Cooper is the daughter of a steelworker and remembers how the town "was booming in those days, while I was growing up.
"It was a good career. My dad, he was 16, and he left school and then went into British Steel and got an apprenticeship straight away.
"It paid our mortgage and it set us up for life. There was a lot more pride in the town, people felt comfortable that they had a job and it was certain and it was safe."
There was general agreement that the government was right to intervene at the weekend, and that British Steel should eventually be renationalised.
"It is giving people hope in the town," said Cooper.
"You need to ... renationalise it as soon as possible," said Kirk, adding no private company will take on the loss-making plant.
"We can't just keep buying cheap steel from China or wherever, they're just flooding the stuff. And it's not right," he said.
He accused the plant's Chinese owners of trying to "run it down... so that they can import their cheap steel over here."
Meanwhile, new bosses appointed by the government are locked in negotiations to secure a future for the plant, and the coal needed to keep the furnaces running.
"I hope they're going in the right direction," said Hopkins, who grew up 10 minutes from the plant.
"I just hope I keep a job. That's all I care about."
UK govt races against time to keep steel furnaces running
London (AFP) April 14, 2025 -
Britain's government on Monday raced to secure raw materials to keep the country's last steelmaking blast furnaces running, as Beijing warned the UK against politicising the takeover of Chinese-owned British Steel.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer's government swooped in on Saturday to prevent the closure of British Steel's main plant in northern Scunthorpe after its Chinese owners Jingye halted orders of raw materials such as coking coal and iron ore.
The Labour-run government must now secure the materials to keep the two blast furnaces at the plant -- the last in the UK which makes steel from scratch -- running.
Government minister James Murray said officials were at the site on Monday.
"Their role is to make sure we do everything we can to ... get those raw materials to the blast furnaces in time," Murray told Times Radio.
Other firms including Tata and Rainham Steel have also offered help securing supplies, the minister added.
Charlotte Brumpton-Childs from the GMB trade union said she was "wholly reassured" that coking coal bound for the plant will be "paid for and unloaded over the next couple of days" at a nearby shipping terminal.
However, Murray and Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds were unable to guarantee they would be able to keep the twin furnaces going.
Blast furnaces are difficult to restart once switched off.
Failure to secure enough supplies to keep them running could seriously damage the plant -- and risk making Britain the only G7 country without virgin steelmaking capacity needed for everything from railways to bridges.
- China tensions -
"If we hadn't acted, the blast furnaces were gone and in the UK primary steel production would have gone," Reynolds said on Sunday.
Reynolds said Jingye had turned down an offer of some GBP 500 million to buy materials, instead requesting more than twice that amount with few guarantees the furnaces would stay open.
Murray clarified Jingye's actions "don't speak to the actions of all Chinese companies".
A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said the UK should "avoid politicising trade cooperation or linking it to security issues, so as not to impact the confidence of Chinese enterprises in going to the UK".
Earlier on Sunday, Reynolds said the UK had been "naive" to allow its steel industry to be bought by the Chinese company, and that he "wouldn't personally bring a Chinese company into our steel sector".
Some opposition British MPs accused Beijing of interference -- with Tory MP Christopher Chope accusing Jingye of "industrial sabotage".
However, the government tried to tread a fine line to avoid inflaming tensions and risk fragile -- but improving -- ties with China.
"It might not be sabotage, it might be neglect," Reynolds told the BBC, clarifying that he did not believe Beijing had been involved in the recent events.
- 'Sensitive' -
While some sectors were "more sensitive than others", a lot of "UK-Chinese trade is in non-contentious areas," Reynolds added.
Starmer's administration has been at pains to improve relations with Beijing, with several high-ranking ministers holding bilateral talks in hopes of spurring economic growth.
However, there are still security concerns and occasional spats, including over the weekend when a UK MP was denied entry into Hong Kong, sparking concerns from Britain's foreign ministry.
Jingye bought British Steel in 2020 and says it has invested more than GBP 1.2 billion ($1.5 billion) to maintain operations, but was losing around GBP 700,000 a day.
The government saw its possible closure as a threat to Britain's long-term economic security, given the decline of the UK's once robust steel industry -- and the threatened loss of some 2,700 jobs at the plant.
The government, which stopped short of nationalising British Steel, is still hopeful of finding a private investor.
"We want to find a private sector partner to co-invest," Murray told Sky News, adding nationalisation remained a "very likely option".
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