British Steel has been brought into public ownership some 15 months after nationalisation was first mooted as a way to protect the UK’s national interests.
In April 2025, the government took emergency control of the UK’s largest remaining integrated steelmaking plant after its Chinese owners, Jingye Group, effectively decided to stop manufacturing at the Scunthorpe facility. British Steel was acquired out of insolvency in 2020, but by the end of 2023, Jingye claimed it had racked up cumulative losses exceeding £350m.
British steel manufacturing is plagued by disproportionately high operating costs compared to international competitors. Jingye frequently cited sky-high UK electricity prices and heavy carbon tax burdens as insurmountable obstacles to running a profitable traditional blast furnace operation.
In early 2025, there were concerns that the firm had been running down its existing raw material supplies and had not ordered enough to keep the two blast furnaces operating. While restarting...