SMELLS and emissions from Sheerness steel mill will probably never be completely eliminated, Tory leader Michael Howard said today.

The Folkestone and Hythe MP, who was visiting the Thamesteel plant at Brielle Way admitted there were tensions between environmental concerns and the need for the business to prosper and create jobs.

He added: “It’s a question of balance. The Environment Agency (EA) are making requirements which will reduce emissions and reduce the extent to which people are affected. But with a plant like this you are probably never going to eliminate the problem altogether.

“You have to work very hard to strike this balance and I am confident that it can be done.”

The EA has given Thamesteel until November 1 to submit improvements plans that will address the pollution problems and ensure that the mill adopts the best available techniques in the near future.

Mill managers have been warned that unless they provide the required level of information by this date then the EA might refuse their application for pollution prevention and a control permit needed by all steelworks under new European Union laws.

Without a permit, steel making operations would have to cease on the site.

Mr Howard, who met the Conservatives’ Sittingbourne and Sheppey parliamentary candidate Gordon Henderson during his visit, previously went to the site to open its old rolling mill.

The rolling mill was stripped out and sold after Allied Steel & Wire went into receivership in 1992, but Keith Plowman, Thamesteel’s general manager for quality assurance and environment, said he hoped Mr Howard would open a new rolling mill which the management planned to install next year.

Blob: Former Allied Steel & Wire (ASW) workers and other people whose pensions disappeared when their firms went bust must be provided with decent retirement incomes, says the Conservative leader.

Mr Howard said his party had called on the Government to use funds from unclaimed assets in banks and building societies to help members of stricken pension schemes.

The Conservative leders added: “If people have not claimed these assets for 20 years, they are never going to claim them. It is sensible to put that money to good use to provide these people with decent pensions.”

Mr Howard said the Government had belatedly come up with a £400 million compensation package for affected pension scheme members.

He added: “It sounds like a lot of money, but it is not. It’s becoming clear that it is not enough.”