Speciality Steel UK: Insolvency

Liam Byrne Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Please, it is not acceptable on either side of the House to take advantage of the Back Benchers who want to get in. You have a set amount of time. If the Minister can stick to it, I expect the shadow Minister to do so. If the Minister goes over time, I do then grant time the other way. Please do not do this again.

Let us come to the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North) (Lab)]

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The Minister needs to respond. It’s been that long that I had forgotten.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liam Byrne]

I congratulate the Minister on saving Britain’s real engineering from years of financial engineering which was not in the best interests of this country and was more in the interests of the self-enrichment of the people behind it. The question for us today, though, is what steps the Government will now take to ensure and safeguard a growing, thriving industry. Will the Minister reassure the House that she will use us on the Committee to oversee the liabilities that the Department has taken on? Crucially, will she set out when she expects those lower energy costs to kick in, when she expects the tariff barriers in the United States to come down, and when she will tie together the steel strategy, which I hope she will publish as soon as possible, for the House to debate?

[Sarah Jones]

I thank my right hon. Friend for those helpful questions. He reminded me that the shadow Minister had asked about the US. Of course, we are in a position where the world has tariffs of 50% on steel and aluminium; we have 25%. We are working with our US counterparts to reach a conclusion to those negotiations. My right hon. Friend will know that the President is due to come to the UK and, of course, we will be doing all we can to get that negotiation concluded at pace.

My right hon. Friend asked about energy costs. We are seeking to ensure that there is a viable steel industry into the future and that those companies currently talking to the official receiver about wanting to take over and invest in Liberty can do so in a way that will make them money. On the charges we are reducing—the 60% to 90% super-charger extension for network charge relief—to give an example, it will mean about £4 to £5 relief per tonne of steel produced. We know that Liberty is not producing what it can at the moment, but two or three years ago it would have been producing about 300 tonnes of steel per year, so it would have saved up to £1.5 million on its energy costs. That is a substantial reduction and something that I am sure he will welcome.

On the liabilities, of course we want to be as honest, open and transparent with the House as we possibly can. A lot of the liabilities are with the creditors at the moment. We want to come to the House as soon as we can to ensure that we are setting out the costs that we incur. My right hon. Friend is right that the steel strategy this year needs to be bold, and we will of course look to the work that his Committee has done to help us in that.