Scunthorpe Steelworks

Debate between Matt Western and Sarah Jones

Monday 7th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing this urgent question and for his comments. I know we will continue to talk and have honest conversations.

Jingye is very much talking to us. As I said, I met Jingye with the Secretary of State and others on Friday, and we hope to do so again this week.

Our priority is respecting the workers, safeguarding jobs and retaining steelmaking. We have been clear in our belief that the best way forward is for Scunthorpe and British Steel to continue as a commercially-run business with private investment and with the Government acting in support, but I can tell the hon. Gentleman that no options are off the table.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

I was concerned to read about the cancellation of shipments of essential coking coal and so on for Scunthorpe. The Business and Trade Committee heard from British Steel and Tata about some of their needs. The Minister will be aware that an area where we have failed as a country over the last six years or so is not having an industrial strategy, so I make clear to her once more the absolute urgency for us to establish a steel plan to set out the UK’s needs and ensure that we have resilience across our industries and for our economy.

[Sarah Jones]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and we talked about exactly that at the Business and Trade Committee. This country has seen a significant decline in steel manufacturing over the last decade, and we want to turn that around. Long before we got into government, we committed to a plan for steel, which represents a £2.5 billion investment in UK steelmaking. As we speak, there is a roundtable at JCB in Stafford on the plan for steel, on this occasion discussing trade barriers—I was due to be chairing but came back to be in the Chamber. We have been having a series of roundtables to gather evidence and pull the facts and figures together so that we can put the right investment in place.

Scunthorpe Steelworks

Debate between Matt Western and Sarah Jones

Thursday 27th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

As the right hon. Gentleman would expect, the Secretary of State is and has been talking to Jingye, as have I and officials. Those negotiations will continue. The site at Scunthorpe produces a lot of different types of steel, as he will know. It provides 95% of all steel used by Network Rail. It is incredibly important in that sense, and he is right to draw attention to that. There are many different ways of making steel. On the primary steel point, we are investigating the merits of investing in direct reduced iron, which is when hydrogen is used instead of the old blast furnaces. The reality is that the Scunthorpe blast furnaces are old infrastructure—decades old—that needs updating. We need to move to new technology, and that is what we are trying to do with Jingye.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

Clearly, the absence of an industrial strategy in the past five years has had an impact, so I welcome the Government’s notion of a steel plan. Given that the industrial strategy features three major elements—construction, defence and energy infrastructure—will the steel plan look not at a 10-year horizon but at one of 25 to 30 years, to ensure that we get the investment we need for the UK to have virgin steel production, like all other 19 countries of the G20?

[Sarah Jones]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his expertise as a member of the Select Committee. We had this debate yesterday. Yes, having a long view has to be the right thing. The Government must ensure that we spend that £2.5 billion of taxpayers’ money in the right way to secure the industry well into the future.

UK Steel Manufacturing

Debate between Matt Western and Sarah Jones

Thursday 5th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

The hon. Gentleman talks about our obsession with decarbonisation and producing green steel, but we also have to go with the market. The market and big companies are now saying to us, “We want to buy green steel”. That is what they are demanding and what we will produce. If we do not, we will not be selling it on the same basis. We will use the money we are investing through the national wealth fund to develop a steel strategy that will enable us to bring new entrants into the UK, which the previous Government did not try to do, so that we can have a vibrant, competitive steel economy in the UK and create good, highly paid jobs in the green industries of the future. If we fall behind, others will come before us and take our jobs.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

Everyone agrees that steel is a crucial strategic foundational industry for this country, but it suffers from very narrow margins. It is one of the least profitable sectors of all. In this country, we suffer from a real cost disadvantage because of energy prices. Other countries, such as France and Germany, have much lower energy costs. They have a lot of nuclear, which meets net zero requirements. Does the Minister agree that underlines the importance of why this country urgently needs an energy strategy?

[Sarah Jones]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We need to ensure we are producing cheap, clean energy in this country. As he rightly says, that means nuclear, as well as solar, wind, offshore wind and everything else in our armoury. This Government have been unbelievably proactive, with the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero ending the ban on onshore wind and agreeing to some of the solar panel installations we need. We had an enormously successful contracts for difference round that will allow floating offshore wind and other types of energy, and we are talking in detail about where we will take nuclear. Together, all those things mean that the country will have lower energy costs, that we can be more competitive and that our industry can thrive.