South Yorkshire steel - providing good jobs for generations
Miriam Cates MP | The Barnsley Chronicle | March 2021
The steel industry is fundamental to the history of South Yorkshire. It’s an industry that has generated a sense of pride and offered employment for generations. Despite a decline in recent decades, steel manufacturing still provides good jobs to people across Barnsley, Sheffield and Rotherham and so the widely reported uncertainty surrounding the finances of Liberty Steel is understandably causing anxiety for hundreds of local families.
That’s why I have been engaging with local management, unions and Government representatives to do everything I can to make sure that the immediate funding challenges are overcome and jobs and livelihoods can be saved.
I am having regular meetings with Secretary of State for Business, Kwasi Kwarteng, and have made him aware of the unique capabilities of Stocksbridge Speciality Steels and its status as an asset of strategic national importance. I have been impressed with Mr Kwarteng’s knowledge of and commitment to the steel industry and he has assured me that he is actively monitoring the local situation and working to build a strong and sustainable steel sector in the UK.
I believe it would be devastating to ignore the UK steel industry just at the point when we’re starting our post pandemic recovery. Steel is a critical material for our economy, with large quantities of steel required for every one of our infrastructure and NetZero ambitions, whether that’s trains, wind turbines, electric vehicles, or low carbon buildings.
Producing our own steel is also important for the environment. UK steel has half the carbon footprint of Chinese imports so it would be counterproductive to let our domestic steel sector decline while importing dirtier steel from abroad. The Government has recently announced a £250m Clean Steel fund to help the steel sector decarbonise, and there is an exciting future for British Green Steel.
As well as needing steel, we also need the jobs that the industry and its wider supply chain provides with steel work wages a significant 46% higher than average here in Yorkshire. It would be much harder to ‘level up’ without these important, high skilled jobs.
COVID-19 has shown us just how important it is to have robust domestic supply. Whether it’s PPE, vaccines or steel, we cannot afford to be dependent on other countries for such essential manufacturing. A thriving domestic steel industry is vital to our security.
The prosperity of modern Britain was built on the sweat and toil of communities in places like Barnsley and Sheffield. But steel should not only be part of our past, it should also be part of the future here in South Yorkshire, at the cutting edge of green technology with well paid, productive jobs.
These are challenging times, but I will continue to do everything possible to support our local steel industry and protect jobs and livelihood.
This article was originally published in the Barnsley Chronicle in March 2021
