Thousands of jobs at risk as India's Tata Steel seeks British exit

[Hans Mann]

A general view shows the town of Port Talbot in Wales, Britain March 30, 2016.
REUTERS/REBECCA NADEN

India's Tata Steel (TISC.NS) is seeking to sell Britain's biggest steelmaking business, putting thousands of jobs at risk in an industry that once dominated Britain but has been brought low by falling prices, high costs and Chinese competition.

After a marathon board meeting in Mumbai, Tata said it would draw a line under its almost decade-long foray into Britain's steel industry, exiting the country entirely.

The move could have an impact on Britain's closely fought vote in three months over whether to stay in the European Union. Britain's traditionally anti-EU media have blamed Brussels for preventing London from taking greater steps to protect the industry, although supporters of membership say EU policy is not responsible for the industry's plight.

Tata, which employs about 15,000 people in Britain at sites including the giant Port Talbot plant in Wales, said its financial performance in Britain had deteriorated sharply in recent months and it wanted to exit as quickly as possible.

The British government and the Welsh authorities said they were looking at all viable options to protect the steel industry, which has already shed thousands of jobs in just the last year.

"We are, and have, and continue to look at all options, and I mean all options. But what we first want to achieve from Tata is this period of time to allow a proper sale process," Anna Soubry, a minister for business, told BBC radio.

She said she could not rule out the possibility of the government buying the plants until a new owner could be found.

The sale ramps up pressure on Prime Minister David Cameron's right-leaning Conservative government, which has sought to cultivate closer ties with China.

Cameron's fate hangs in the balance when Britain votes on whether to stay in the EU in May, and his government has sought to avoid controversies during the runup to the vote.

The Conservatives are resented in Britain's industrial heartlands for the demise of mining and manufacturing under former prime minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

The government has said it is taking measures to help the steel sector but the fundamental problem remained the halving of steel prices in the past year, caused by overcapacity in China.

Once a driver of the economy through the 19th and 20th centuries, many of Britain's former steel towns have been decimated by the industry's decline since its peak in the 1970s.

The leader of the opposition Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn, called on the government to take a public stake in the industry which he called "the cornerstone of our manufacturing sector".

Tata Steel bought Anglo-Dutch steelmaker Corus in 2007 and has since struggled to turn the giant around.

Port Talbot, though far from its 1960s peak, still employs about 4,000 people, and Tata is one of the most significant private companies in Wales.

Unions welcomed the decision not to shutter the plants but called on Tata to be a "responsible seller" and on the government to play its role.

"We don't just want more warm words. We want a detailed plan of action to find buyers and build confidence in potential investors in UK steel," Roy Rickhuss, general secretary of steelworkers' trade union Community, said.

Steelmakers in Britain pay some of the highest energy costs and green taxes in the world and are also struggling to compete with record Chinese steel imports, which they say....

Thousands of jobs at risk as India's Tata Steel seeks British exit | Reuters

[harrybarracuda]

Can't get British workers to work for lower caste Indian wages.

[klong toey]

Just stop sending aid to India divert the money to the British steel industry.
Trouble is fighting a losing battle with all the cheap Chinese steel flooding the market.

[Dapper]

Get Corbyn in and re-nationalise the lot.

[wasabi]

I've been avoiding this story as it's so yesterday, haven't we lived through this all before, pits closing, works closing.
It's been happening for decades.

[billy the kid]

re-nationalise

don't believe they would allow only imports. Bit of a backbone for brit industry here.

crown jewel.

[piwanoi]

Get Corbyn in and re-nationalise the lot.

Yeah sure why not , a great idea , look what happened with British Steel in the late 70s under Labour https://news.google.com/newspapers?n...3,908331&hl=en its quite simple third World prices for Steel and wages means only one thing in the end .

[Chittychangchang]

Bailing out the bankers is o.k. but saving several thousand jobs and the knock on affect to the surrounding business's and people is an acceptable loss...

Stop the foreign aid and cheap imports from China.

The U.K steel industry can turn a profit with strong government leadership.
It did before and can again.

[blue]

its quite simple third World prices for Steel and wages means only one thing in the end

what ?
make nothing , set up UK as a money laundering launderette, and sell our houses and land to the 3rd world slave masters , in exchange for the privilege of buying crap at the pound shop.
Those bastards can make everything cheaper than us...

I seem to remember Adam smith had the answer , when blowing his trumpet about free trade, saying even if one country can make everything cheaper than the other, it's still advantageous for both sides to have totally free trade because ...........

Unfortunately, I'm too old to remember what his said next.
might have been , because you can teach your woman to say 'love you long time' or something ..

[piwanoi]

Bailing out the bankers is o.k. but saving several thousand jobs and the knock on affect to the surrounding business's and people is an acceptable loss...

Stop the foreign aid and cheap imports from China.

The U.K steel industry can turn a profit with strong government leadership.
It did before and can again.

They did,nt have cheap imports from China in the late 70s they just over produced and made a glut (read my link) , our problem IMO is that the trades unions was running the UK not the Government , the very trade unions that lost the labour Government the GE in the Winter of discontent when the UK was bankrupt , private enterprise should be left to run business's, we have just seen the result of Govt meddling in Business here in Thailand with the lunatic rice scheme , were many learned economist's say the losses could be 1 trillion baht .

[DrB0b]

Vote for tories, reap the whirlwind. The British electorate have turned into a bunch of psychotic self-harmers, or at least that small minority of narrow minded bigots the idiotic British electoral system gives power to.
Serves them right, whinging, self-pitying morons!

[piwanoi]

Vote for tories, reap the whirlwind. The British electorate have turned into a bunch of psychotic self-harmers, or at least that small minority of narrow minded bigots the idiotic British electoral system gives power to.
Serves them right, whinging, self-pitying morons!

Are you trying to inform me that the Wilson /Callaghan Labour Govt was Successful? FFS GET A GRIP !!

[piwanoi]

Just done a bit of research , Currently only 2 thirds of the Worlds Steel production is actually being used ,(all the Torys fault) so in effect that could well mean more misery not less , why pay people for making some thing that is surplus to requirements ? and for those who say stop Chinese imports , pray how do you do that? I remember British steel in the 70s under labour was losing a Million pounds a day and the NCB was the same story too , no one has divine right to tax payers money , not in that volume any way , bale outs very seldom work ,one only has to look at the total disaster of Greece to know that . whats the answer? ain't a clue

[billy the kid]

Military- steel
go together like a horse and.......

[CaptainNemo]

Not all steel is the same, which makes me wonder why would anyone want to use cheap chinese steel?

It's not going to help the EU-in-crowd this, because it looks like EU sluggishness on sorting out tarriffs, alas, it's our succession of shit governments of both shades of brown, who refuse to protect anything of value (but are happy to protect things of no value) - and just hand it over... we invented steel, computer industry is another one, vehicle industry, train manufacturing industry, whilst other countries innovate and add value to these things. Let's hope nanotech, biotech, and robotics don't go the same way.

[blue]

Tata Steel's pensions add to hurdles for a rescue bid

Tata Steel’s hunt for a buyer to save its British business could be hampered by the firm’s £15bn pension scheme,
The business, which employs 15,000 people at Port Talbot and other sites around the country, is saddled with more than 130,000 savers who are entitled to a pension.

so how does a firm employing 15 k people get to have 130k savers with an average? of over £100.000 pension pot each ?

[wasabi]

The Chinese will buy the plant, dismantle it and ship it to China

[DrB0b]

Serves the stupid British bastards right. What did they think they were voting for? They thought the government were going to shaft the poor and the smug, vicious, small-minded selfish bastards rejoiced in that, they never realised that to a government of billionaires THEY were the poor. Serves them right, idiots. This is just the start. Lets hope they remember what they said about benefit scroungers and make no claim on the public purse now THEY'RE destitute.

Never mind, the stupid bastards will do what they've been trained to do and blame it all on immigrants and the EU.

[wasabi]

Ye that's about right mate, Jeremy Corbyn would have sorted it out.

[DrB0b]

Ye that's about right mate, Jeremy Corbyn would have sorted it out.

It was already sorted out a long time ago but then Britain, as a nation, went insane. As soon as British Steel was privatised it was clear what was going to happen. 40 years ago almost all the major British industries were owned by the people then, in one of the greatest con jobs of all time, the British were convinced that they were too stupid to look after their own industries and it would be better all round if they were sold to the French, Indians, and Chinese. It's one of the most stupid things a nation has ever done and even though we're now seeing the results of those policies and Britain becomes more and more of a has-been the morons still can't see how they've been fucked over. Its like watching a whole nation addicted to self-harm.

[BigRed]

Not all steel is the same, which makes me wonder why would anyone want to use cheap chinese steel?

It's not going to help the EU-in-crowd this, because it looks like EU sluggishness on sorting out tarriffs, alas, it's our succession of shit governments of both shades of brown, who refuse to protect anything of value (but are happy to protect things of no value) - and just hand it over... we invented steel, computer industry is another one, vehicle industry, train manufacturing industry, whilst other countries innovate and add value to these things. Let's hope nanotech, biotech, and robotics don't go the same way.

I thought the same then read this:
Britain sacrifices steel industry to curry favour with China

seems we are blocking EU attempts to regulate.

[Norton]

Serves them right, whinging, self-pitying morons!

Brittles had it coming.

[DrB0b]

Serves them right, whinging, self-pitying morons!

Brittles had it coming.

Ssssh, hardly anyone knows Texpat's a group effort. Don't blow our cover!

[piwanoi]

Ye that's about right mate, Jeremy Corbyn would have sorted it out.

It was already sorted out a long time ago but then Britain, as a nation, went insane. As soon as British Steel was privatised it was clear what was going to happen. 40 years ago almost all the major British industries were owned by the people then, in one of the greatest con jobs of all time, the British were convinced that they were too stupid to look after their own industries and it would be better all round if they were sold to the French, Indians, and Chinese. It's one of the most stupid things a nation has ever done and even though we're now seeing the results of those policies and Britain becomes more and more of a has-been the morons still can't see how they've been fucked over. Its like watching a whole nation addicted to self-harm.

Quite evidently your bigoted mind won't allow you to read the link in my post #7 or my post #13

[piwanoi]

Hey Doc , You'll trying to tell me next that the Torys shut more coal mines down that the labour party did Instead of this vitriolic ranting put some flesh on the bones of your contentions ,under labour both the Steel and Coal industry was one complete fuck up from start to finish , heres another for you to completely ignore http://www.thecommentator.com/articl..._and_daughters