MOST of the publicity for steel giant Corus in the past 12 months has been uniformly bad. But the company that slashed over 2,000 jobs in Gwent says business life must go on. NIGEL JARRETT reports from a changing site.

THE train now arriving at Llanwern steelworks is very long and has come all the way from Teesside.

It brings steel slabs on low-loader trucks via a new rail infrastructure that marks an important investment for Corus in Newport.

The transport of steel to a plant that has now ceased making it as part of last year's 'restructuring' is a major logistics exercise.

Corus says it is an example of the company's long-term commitment to Llanwern. In fact, the Newport plant is being unofficially branded as the 'New' Llanwern. That commitment is now concentrated almost entirely on rolling steel into the strip products that go into everything from car body parts to new buildings.

It's a 'smart' operation, according to Dr Mark Carr, Corus's new UK strip products boss in South Wales, and the intention is to get the remaining 'light' end of the operation looking smart as well.

It's all part of an attempt to increase involvement of the community and opinion-formers in the work of the company, which has been left in no doubt that last year's job losses would never be taken lightly or even forgiven. Corus is trying to raise a very low profile by looking to the future.

The train from Teesside brings steel from Corus plants in the North-East on a route which circumnavigates what used to be the 'heavy' end of the plant.

There are around half a dozen deliveries a day, and the new inlet avoids interference with rail despatch operations of finished products further downstream.

As seen from a point not much less than half-way along the whole site, the western area of Llanwern, now zoned for demolition and clearance, is rapidly changing. The breakers are in and are expertly razing to the ground anything that has no saleable value except as scrap metal, much of it destined for Port Talbot, where steel is still made. The explosion at Port Talbot's No 5 blastfurnace last year and its toll of death and injury has left Llanwern with the job of finding a few other sources of ready-made steel to supplement what is coming from the North-East.

But this is a temporary measure. Llanwern will soon be guaranteed supplies of steel from Corus's own resources after the repair of the damaged Port Talbot furnace.

Coke ovens, the last remaining functional part of the heavy end, have been kept going not because of the coke they produce, which is now redundant at Llanwern, but for the gas products of the process which are used in the heat-hardening (annealing) sections of the plant and also to re-heat the imported steel before rolling.

The 130,000 tons of coke created is waiting to be sent to Port Talbot to be used in steelmaking.

The Llanwern coke ovens are due to close at the end of the month. Almost 400 men have been employed there, and efforts have been continuing with the agencies called in to help mitigate last year's job losses to find them alternative work within the company (crossmatching) or help them with re-training and job-seeking.

As previously reported in the Argus, Corus is pleased with the relatively small number of 'hard' redundancies left after the announcement of 1,540 job losses this time last year - 124 at Llanwern, excluding the coke oven teams. While few of the workers who have found alternative employment or have retired will be enjoying the level of wages and relative security they had in the steel industry, despite its ups and downs, the company says it has done its best by them with the help of job-finder and training agencies such as the Employment Service, Careers Wales, the ISTC union, the Welsh Development Agency and the National Council for Education and Learning for Wales.

Hard redundancies are those where men have left the company having been neither cross-matched nor allowed to retire early. As well as with the Llanwern coke oven operators, Corus is concentrating its attention on achieving a low hard redundancy figure at Ebbw Vale, where its tinplate works is due to close this summer.

But the most impressive sight of the old Llanwern steelworks - or 'depressing', depending on your nostalgia rating - is the demolition. Corus prefers the more optimistic term 'regeneration', of which knocking down redundant 'kit' is merely the initial part. In December work began on the first phase, which involved taking down the overhead ore conveyors and dynamiting the ore discharge hoppers.

The actual steelmaking area, more concentrated and more densely crammed with machinery, will take longer, not only in terms of clearance but also in order to assess the extent of pollution.

To render the vacated land fit for renewal, all of it, bore-hole investigations are being carried out, and the results of these will determine what has to be done to return it to a manageable state and what it will be used for.

Newport council is keenly interested in the long-term future of the site, a huge 'brownfield' area by any standards. Because of its close proximity to what remains of the Llanwern steelworks, most immediately the hot strip mill, it is likely to be put to some kind of industrial use.

While Corus continues its involvement with the community in other ways - £50,000 towards restoration of the Monmouthshire-Brecon canal and social activities in Ringland and Alway - the company is still adamant that Llanwern Social Club at the western corner of the site will close.

It says the reason why it hasn't served notice of closure on the club trustees is that ways of providing the facilities the club offers, but in another place, are still being investigated. Dr Carr says Corus has to be even more competitive and provide an improved service in a UK market that is still shrinking in total terms.

Good news of demand from car manufacturers and the construction industry leave cause for optimism. But in the steel industry, no-one sits around waiting for the good times to roll.