Daniel Forrest, Teesside Socialist Party
Negotiations between the Labour government and Jingye group, the owners of British Steel, continue to grind along like two bureaucratic, self-interested icebergs, whilst the future of our steel industry hangs by a thread.
The last plant in Britain to make steel from iron ore stands in Scunthorpe which employs around 4,000 people. This comes after thousands of jobs were ruthlessly cut by Tata Steel at their Port Talbot plant in south Wales.
The government are in talks with Jingye over the future of the plant, with a government ‘investment plan’ being mulled over to convert existing blast furnaces into electric arc furnaces. In plain English, the taxpayer will pay around half of the cost, whilst Jingye would take out all of the profits, as happened with Tata in Port Talbot! All the while, workers’ jobs are held hostage as part of bargaining by the company.
In a half-hearted statement, the business secretary Jonathan Reynolds has talked about potentially nationalising the plant. British Steel spent ten months under government ownership in 2020, only to be sold off to the highest bidder (the now-owner Jingye) after the public spent £600 million keeping the industry afloat.
Instead of this fleecing of the state and taxpayer by billionaires, we say nationalise British Steel permanently! Not for ten months. Not for ten weeks. Permanently and with compensation only on the basis of proven need. By doing this not only could we take the noose away from the neck of British steelmaking, but revitalise it under workers’ control. Expanding production, not only saving but creating high-skilled unionised jobs, then using that steel to rebuild Britain for the working class. (See ‘Greenlashed! Capitalism and Tata Steel’ at socialistparty.org.uk for how workers could transition to green steel production without a devastating loss of jobs.)
The capitalist class has shown its utter contempt for steel and manufacturing in general for over forty years. If they won’t run it in the interests of the working class, then the working class should own it and run it ourselves.
