The steelworkers were made redundant without 90 days' notice

An employment tribunal ruled over 700 of them should be compensated because administrators KPMG had failed to talk to unions before making them redundant.

ASW went into receivership in July 2002 but the move paves the way for a case to be brought by the Sheerness workers.

Pat Wiggins, of their union, Community, said their case was now being pursued.

'Very stressful'

The former employees of the Cardiff site are expected to receive the equivalent of 90 days pay, although KPMG could still appeal the decision.

Mr Wiggins, the Sheerness branch secretary, said it was good news for Cardiff, and action to get compensation for the Kent workers had already begun.

He said he was very confident the employees would win their case.

"Our case is a bit stronger. They [KPMG] did do some talking to Cardiff but they didn't talk to us at all," he explained.

He added: "We've lost our pensions, we had a redundancy agreement, which we lost... We're looking at a minimum of �3,500, it could be more," he said.

Mr Wiggins said the whole case had been very stressful for all those involved, a lot of whom were now near their retirement.

The ASW employees in Cardiff and Kent lost the bulk of their pensions when the company was declared bankrupt in 2002.