Derbyshire council aims to create more than 2,500 new jobs with old ironworks site redevelopment

Erewash Borough Council has made a bid for £6 million to build two roundabouts to create access for a huge overhaul of the former Stanton Ironworks with the creation of acres of space for new businesses.

It has made the pitch to the D2N2 Local Enterprise Partnership, an organisation mandated by government, which funds public sector works which boost job creation and home building plans.

The council’s pitch says: “Building of two new roundabouts and a link road to aid traffic flow to development site.

"This will in-turn unlock 23 hectares (57 acres) at the Stanton employment site for development with the potential to unlock over 2,500 jobs.”

Meanwhile, D2N2’s feedback is: “The project would deliver good value for money based on the outputs presented.

"Site acquisition has not yet been completed and consents around planning etc remain to be approved.

"Potential state aid issues are also in place.”

This comes 13 years after the works closed, five years since the borough council recommended that plans to develop the 470-acre former ironworks were refused and four years since it published a guide for what it would accept.

That plan includes 2,000 homes, a new primary school, shops and health services, a 22-acre business park, 45-acres of employment land and a 55-acre wildlife park.

Ian Sankey, the borough council’s deputy chief executive and director of resources, said: “This project was submitted as part of D2N2’s ‘pipeline call’ in August for robust projects that could be considered in reserve for possible funding.

“It is very early days, with commercially-sensitive work, planning procedures and other details all needing to be progressed. As such, it is not possible to release any further details at this stage.”

French firm Saint-Gobain remains the owner of the former iron works, which closed in 2007, and still operates part of its piping business from the Lows Lane site in Ilkeston.

It is focusing on its existing business.

The firm previously said it had been working for several years to market the site and was working with ‘a number of interested organisations’ to do so.

Last summer, Coun Michael Powell, the borough council’s lead member for regeneration and planning, had said: “Despite interest in the site from potential developers, it is disappointing that the site owner has been unable to agree terms on a sale.”

The origins of the Stanton Ironworks are thought to date back to 1846 when Chesterfield man, Benjamin Smith and his son Josiah, brought three blast-furnaces into production alongside the banks of the now disused Nutbrook Canal.

The foundry was once seen as the most important bomb-making factory of World War II.

During the war, the Stanton Gate Foundry (known to later generations as the Erewash Foundry) produced 873,500 bomb casings.

A BBC report from 2009 said that ‘the death-knell for the foundry sounded when Britain joined the Common Market – and iron production went abroad’.

At its height, 7,000 people were employed at the Stanton works.

The last iron pipes were produced on May 24, 2007, when 185 workers left the site for the final time.