Youth Fight for Jobs campaigners speak out on Corus closure

Corus steel workers on the Unite jobs demonstration in Birmingham, photo Paul Mattsson   (Click to enlarge)

Paul Phillips, 21, Northern regional organiser of Youth Fight for Jobs said: "It is obvious that this government is not serious about safeguarding jobs. They are only interested in safeguarding the rich bankers and their large pay packets.

"This is a devastating blow not just to workers in Teesside but to the whole country. Yet none of the three major parties have come out in support of these workers showing that none of them represent workers in this country."

Hannah Walter, 24, Teesside, Unison national executive said, in a personal capacity: "The news that 1,700 jobs will be lost at Corus on Teesside is a devastating blow for local people.

"For youth in particular, with a 20% unemployment rate, this represents the destruction of more secure and well paid jobs on Teesside.

"The government has paid £850 billion to bail out the banks - but they cry 'poverty' when it comes to supporting ordinary working people.

"The trade unions should get behind the Corus workers and back any action they take, demanding that Corus is nationalised, not like the banks but under the democratic control of workers and the local community."