The government has convened a group bringing together industry leaders from major steel companies in the UK ahead of the launch of a strategy designed to reinvigorate the struggling sector.
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds will chair the first meeting of the Steel Council today alongside members of firms such as British Steel and Tata Steel and a number of trade unions.
The UK’s steel industry has been in decline for decades, but the sector is now facing some particularly challenging hurdles that present an existential threat to domestic producers. It is having difficulty competing with producers in China and India, and so is facing a raft of closures and lay-offs.
The Port Talbot steelworks, the largest domestic steelmaking site left standing, is getting ready to close its blast furnaces, which will lead to at least 2,500 job losses. Tata Steel, the Indian conglomerate that operates the facility, said the site was losing £1m a day and was financially unsustainable.
Meanwhile, industry...
