ONLY weeks before the closure of the region's last cigarette manufacturing plant, a decision is yet to be made about a legacy promised for the hundreds of redundant workers.

Bosses at Rothmans' parent company British American Tobacco (BAT) pledged to leave a legacy for the 490 workers being made redundant at its factory in Darlington, due to close next month.

In October, it said it would work with Darlington Borough Council and other community leaders to provide the legacy. But both the council and BAT said no final decision has yet been made as to what that will entail.

Tom Roberts, from BAT, said he hoped a decision would be made by the end of the month.

He said: "We are concentrating on supporting our staff who are affected directly by this, but we also want to do something additional to that.

"We recognise the closure of the factory does have a local impact, so we are looking at doing something extra that will leave something behind for the whole community, as well as our employees.".

He said only 212 staff remain at the factory, and 70 per cent of the 279 who have already left have been successful in finding alternative employment.

Mr Roberts said 104 workers have been transferred to other jobs within the company, 74 have found new employment, 12 have become self-employed, 32 have retired, six are retraining, 13 are unable to work, 31 are seeking employment and six have not registered their intentions.

He said some of those who have found employment have moved into similar manufacturing roles, after interest from other firms keen to recruit the Rothmans employees. Others have found jobs with Darlington Council.

Mr Roberts said: "For those wanting to retrain there has been a lot of interest in HGV driving, or becoming plumbers. Some people have also been looking at getting into gas fitting."

A study looking at the impact of the factory closure on those being made redundant and the local economy has been carried out by One NorthEast for Darlington Council, but the document is not being made public.

After the factory halts production a small number of staff will remain until the end of the year to clear the site.

The future of the Rothmans site is unclear as BAT holds the lease on it from landlords Marchday Group Plc, for the next eight years.

Mr Roberts said they would be looking to either surrender the lease to the landlord or sub-let the site.