Political reporter
The business secretary has refused to confirm if the government can get the sufficient raw material supplies in time to keep the blast furnaces at British Steel running, after it took control of the Chinese-owned plant.
Emergency legislation was rushed through Parliament on Saturday to prevent owners Jingye shutting down its two blast furnaces in Scunthorpe.
Asked if he could guarantee the furnaces would remain open, Jonathan Reynolds said he would not comment “on the commercial aspect of supply” but the takeover gave the “opportunity” to obtain the coal needed.
The government said Jingye had been selling off raw materials, as well as not ordering more, before officials took control.
Asked several times by Laura Kuenssberg on whether he was sure he would be able to get the supply of coal before current stocks run out, Reynolds insisted “I’m not going to get into that” but the takeover “was essential to maintaining steel production in the UK”.
Speaking on the programme, Reynolds said the situation remains “difficult and challenging”.
But Saturday’s emergency legislation “enables” the government to keep the blast furnaces working, he said. Once a blast furnace is switched off it becomes incredibly difficult to restart production.
“If we hadn’t acted the blast furnaces were gone and in the UK primary steel production would have gone,” he said.
“If we hadn’t acted, you’d be asking how we support the thousands who’ve lost their jobs.”
The Conservatives have criticised the government for not stepping in sooner to save the plant and protect jobs.
Speaking to the BBC, Tory shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith said “the government could have seen this coming earlier”.
He called the deal a “botched nationalisation” but argued the Conservatives supported the deal because “this because it’s the least worst option on the table”.
Reynolds said the government intervened after “it became clear” that Jingye was intent on closing down the blast furnaces, no matter what financial support it received from the government.
The company rejected an offer of support in the region of £500 million, the government said, instead demanding more than twice that figure with few guarantees the blast furnaces would stay open.
In the Commons on Saturday, Reynolds said Jingye had not been negotiating “in good faith”, while on Sunday he suggested it had not been acting “rationally”.
Jingye had put the UK’s ability to produced virgin steel at risk, Reynolds told the programme – adding “it might not be sabotage, it might be neglect”.
British Steel’s plant in Scunthorpe is the last plant in the UK capable of producing virgin steel, which has fewer imperfections and is used in major construction projects like new buildings and railways.
Were the plant to cease production, the UK would become the only member of the G7 group of leading economies without the ability to make it – a prospect the government views as a risk to the country’s long-term economic security.
The government is looking for a buyer to take over British Steel.
Earlier on Sunday, Reynolds told Sky News he would not sell it to another Chinese company.
He said: “I think we have got to be clear about what is the sort of sector where, actually, we can promote and co-operate, and ones frankly where we can’t. I wouldn’t personally bring a Chinese company into our steel sector.”
Reynolds told the BBC he could not say what the British Steel takeover will cost taxpayers while a buyer is found.
He argued the market value of the company is “effectively zero” and the taxpayer will have to “stand behind” the company’s losses of around £700,000 a day.
Asked about whether the 2019 sale to Jingye was a mistake by the Boris Johnson government, Griffith said the Conservatives had approved “the only deal on the table” – and with support from unions and local MPs.
Since then the “world has changed” and China has become a less reliable partner, he argued.
Reform UK Leader Nigel Farage criticised the Conservatives for selling a “strategic industry to a foreign government”.
He told the BBC there was “no such thing” as a large private company in China and questioned Jingye’s motivation for buying British Steel.
Farage, whose party has argued for a full nationalisation of British Steel, said: “We need a complete re-think about British industry.”
“We are living through an industrial massacre,” he added.
Speaking during the parliamentary debate on Saturday, Green MP Ellie Chowns said steel was integral to the “green industrial transformation” – including making wind turbines, trains and tracks – and nationalisation would give the UK the control it needs to renew the industry.
Liberal Democrat Treasury spokeswoman Daisy Cooper urged ministers to use the “unprecedented legislation judiciously”.
