The raw materials needed to keep British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant operating have been paid for, Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner has said – but she would not be drawn on when they would arrive.

Officials have been racing to obtain enough iron and coal to keep the furnaces at the UK’s last virgin steel-producing plant going – because if they cool down too much, the molten iron solidifies and blocks the furnaces.

It comes after ministers rushed through an emergency bill on Saturday to take over the facility after talks with Chinese owners Jingye broke down.

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Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the government had been prompted into action after learning that the firm had stopped ordering new raw materials to keep the plant running and planned on selling off supplies it already had.

Speaking to reporters from the site in Scunthorpe on Monday afternoon, Ms Rayner said: “We’ve got the raw materials, they’ve been paid for, and we’re confident that the furnaces will continue to fire.”

Asked whether the materials would be arriving on Monday, the deputy PM only said: “As I say, we’ve got the raw materials, and everything’s in place, and we’re confident that the furnaces will continue.”

Earlier, Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury James Murray told Sky News the raw materials were “in the UK” and “nearby” the Lincolnshire site.

He said there were “limits to what I can say” because there were “commercial operations going on here”.

The prime minister’s official spokesman said there were two ships carrying materials docked at Immingham port in North Lincolnshire, with “a third ship which is currently en route off the coast of Africa, which will be making its way to the UK”.

Ministers have faced questions over why they are only just acting now, given unions warned earlier this month that Jingye decided to cancel future orders for the iron ore, coal and other raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running.

Parliament was recalled on Saturday so that emergency legislation could be passed bringing the steelworks into effective government control and officials were on site as soon as the new legislation came into force.

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Ms Rayner would not be drawn on the long-term plan, nor whether other buyers were interested or whether it would come down to nationalisation.

She said: “We’ve taken nothing off the table. We’d like to see private investment going forward… we’re confident of the future of British Steel.”

‘No evidence of sabotage’

Ms Rayner said the government “hasn’t seen any evidence” of sabotage, when asked about suggestions that Jingye might have purposefully attempted to shut the blast furnaces down.

The Chinese company stepped in with a deal to buy British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant out of insolvency five years ago.

Mr Reynolds told MPs on Saturday that the intention of Jingye… “was to cancel and refuse to pay for existing orders” which would have “irrevocably and unilaterally closed down primary steelmaking at British Steel”.

Appearing on Sky News’ Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips, the business secretary said he would not bring a Chinese company into the “sensitive” steel sector again.

Commenting on the situation for the first time on Monday, a Chinese embassy spokesperson urged the British government to act with “fairness, impartiality and non-discrimination… to make sure the legitimate rights and interests of the Chinese company be protected”.

“It is an objective fact that British steel companies have generally encountered difficulties in recent years,” it added.

Companies including Tata – which ran the now-closed Port Talbot steelworks – and Rainham Steel have offered managerial support and materials to keep the Lincolnshire site running.

Union officials have said they are “hopeful” that the materials required at the North Lincolnshire works will arrive within the next 48 hours.

However Andy Prendergast, national secretary at the GMB, said there still needs to be “a deal to be done for the future” and their preference is “nationalisation of what is a key national asset”.

The Conservatives accused the government of acting “too late” and implementing a “botched nationalisation” after ignoring warnings about the risk to the steelworks.

Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith said: “The Labour government have landed themselves in a steel crisis entirely of their own making.

“They’ve made poor decisions and let the unions dictate their actions.”

A long-running strike by bin workers, that has left rubbish piling up on Birmingham’s streets, will continue after union members “overwhelmingly rejected” the city council’s offer in a fresh ballot.

The action by members of Unite, which began on 11 March as part of a dispute over pay, has seen thousands of tonnes of rubbish go uncollected and warnings of a public health emergency.

Hundreds of workers have been on all-out strike for a month, and residents have complained about “rats as big as cats”.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner visited Birmingham last week and called on the union to accept a “significantly improved” deal for workers.

However, the union said hundreds of its members had rejected the “totally inadequate” offer.

The offer, if it had been accepted, would have included “substantial pay cuts for workers” and “did not address potential pay cuts for 200 drivers”, according to Unite.

The latest ballot comes after previous talks failed.

Unite has been campaigning against plans to cut the post of waste recycling and collection officer (WRCO) from the city’s refuse and recycling service.

The union claims it will lead to around 150 of its members having their pay cut by up to £8,000 a year.

But the council has disputed the figures, saying only 17 workers will be affected, losing far less than Unite is claiming.

Local government minister Jim McMahon said the union’s rejection of the pay offer will be “deeply disappointing for Birmingham residents who have already endured weeks of disruption”.

“There is a fair and reasonable offer on the table and I would urge Unite to end the strikes and return to talks to reach the resolution that is fair to the workers and residents of the city,” he added.

‘Rejection of the offer is no surprise’

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “The rejection of the offer is no surprise as these workers simply cannot afford to take pay cuts of this magnitude to pay the price for bad decision after bad decision.”

Unite national lead Onay Kasab told Sky News: “The proposal from the employers was completely and utterly inadequate. It still included a pay cut. It included a sharp cliff-edge drop in pay for our members.

“Unfortunately, the biggest thing about the proposal was what it didn’t include. It didn’t include the details of how and when the drivers are going to have their pay cut and what’s going to be done to mitigate that. It didn’t include issues around what happens if people finish their training and there are no vacancies for them.

“But what it did show up was this so-called figure of only 17 people being impacted is complete and utter nonsense. The proposal itself, that we’ve got in paper, impacts more than 17 people.”

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Wendy Morton, a Conservative MP whose Aldridge-Brownhills constituency is in the Walsall borough, said rats in Birmingham – labelled Squeaky Blinders – “must be dancing in the streets”.

She said: “This really shows yet again Labour-led Birmingham Council and this Labour government are failing residents and our region.

“They need to get a grip, stop blaming others, and face the unions – their paymasters. The Squeaky Blinders must be dancing in the streets.”

Rats have been seen scurrying around mounting piles of rubbish, food waste and bin bags outside homes, shops and restaurants in the city since the strike began.

‘It has been really bad’

A Birmingham resident whose car was wrecked by rats in a street where piles of rubbish were “as tall as” him is “disappointed” bin workers have rejected the council’s offer.

Adam Yasin, 33, from the Balsall Heath area of the city, said: “It’s more to do with hygiene on the streets. I take my son to the nursery and I use a specific street and honestly it was blocked. It’s just annoying, and when the kids are there they like to touch things as well.”

He said his Mercedes was “completely written off” just weeks ago because rats had chewed through wires in the engine.

He said: “It has been really bad, especially where I live, there are a lot of restaurants there. I swear there was a pile (of rubbish) as tall as me, I kid you not.

“Today they collected the rubbish that was on the floor, so the bags that were on the floor, but the bins are still left.”

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What has the council said?

Birmingham City Council said: “It is incredibly disappointing, that despite several weeks of extensive negotiations, Unite have rejected a second offer of settlement. However, our door remains open.

“The council must deliver improved waste services for our citizens – who simply deserve better.

“We must also guard against future equal pay claims, and while we have sought throughout the negotiations to protect pay for individuals, Unite’s proposals focus solely on retaining a role that does not exist in other councils and represents an equal pay risk for Birmingham.

“We have made a fair and reasonable offer and every employee affected by the removal of the WRCO role could take an equivalent graded role in the council, LGV Driver training or voluntary redundancy packages.”

It comes as the government called in military planners to help tackle the mounting piles of rubbish in Birmingham.

Amid an “ongoing public health risk” posed by the mounds of waste, the planners have been assigned to provide logistical support for a short period. The move has not involved soldiers being deployed to collect rubbish.

‘Army logistics deployed’

Ms Rayner insisted there were “no boots on the ground”.

She said “we’ve deployed a couple of army logistics to help with the logistical operation of clearing up the rubbish”.

“We’ve got over two-thirds of the rubbish cleared off the streets now, this week we’ll start to see cleaning up the pavements and streets as well as the clearance of all of that rubbish, I’m very pleased about that. The kids are off school, obviously it’s Easter holidays, we want that rubbish cleared.”

Waste collections have been disrupted since January, before the all-out strike started last month.

Birmingham City Council declared a major incident on 31 March in response to public health concerns.

Actress Samantha Davis, the wife of Warwick Davis, died after suffering a cardiac arrest hours before she was due to be discharged from hospital, an inquest has found.

Mrs Davis, 53, died at London’s University College Hospital on 24 March last year.

She had been admitted six and a half weeks earlier, after a disc prolapse caused a sudden loss of mobility in her lower limbs.

She then underwent a thoracotomy operation – a surgical procedure where the chest wall is opened – on 20 February.

Following a second thoracotomy on 14 March, Mrs Davis’s condition improved and the hospital was planning to discharge her, the inquest at Inner West London Coroner’s Court heard.

However, she went into cardiac arrest at 11.25pm on 23 March, and was pronounced dead at 0.28am on 24 March, after a failed attempt to resuscitate her.

Senior coroner Professor Fiona Wilcox said she was satisfied the cause of death “should be arrhythmic cardiac arrest and complications following left thoracotomies”.

Mrs Davis had achondroplasia, a bone growth disorder which results in dwarfism, “complicated by very severe spinal problems” requiring multiple surgeries from 2016, the coroner added.

The hospital delivered “nothing but excellent care” and all of Mrs Davis’s “complications were appropriately managed”, Prof Wilcox said.

“It is frankly heartbreaking that the surgery itself was successful only for complications to arise and to cause her death,” she added.

David Lawrence, a cardiothoracic surgeon at University College London Hospitals, said Mrs Davis’s condition had been “progressing well”.

During her hospital stay, she had two surgical chest drains removed – the second on the day she suffered the cardiac arrest, he said.

“Very sadly, on the night this happened, the original plan had been that she would be discharged home the following day,” he told the inquest.

“We had good evidence that this patient had a chest x-ray that was acceptable, very stable observations and this patient did not bleed during the day.”

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Mr Davis, known for his film roles in the Star Wars and Harry Potter series, dedicated his BAFTA film fellowship award to Mrs Davis during an emotional tribute at the ceremony in February.

The couple met on the set of 1988 film Willow. They married three years later and have two children.

They founded the charity Little People UK in 2012 to help individuals with dwarfism and their families.