On the north bank of the Tees, the whirr of machinery can still be heard at the huge Billingham chemicals complex as oil and gas is converted into fertilisers, plastics and industrial gases.

But behind the activity lies the humbling of the company whose name was once synonymous with this site in the north-east of England. Imperial Chemical Industries – its name redolent of the days when British manufacturing bestrode the globe – left years ago, driven out of the bulk chemicals business by low-cost competition from overseas.