{"id":6533,"date":"2015-10-29T15:51:01","date_gmt":"2015-10-29T15:51:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=6533"},"modified":"2015-10-30T11:55:38","modified_gmt":"2015-10-30T11:55:38","slug":"steel-future-snubbed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=6533","title":{"rendered":"Steel future snubbed"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

The steel crisis is so important that fewer than two dozen Tory MPs bothered to attend the Parliamentary debate yesterday (October 28) demanding emergency government action. But then again secretary of state Sajid Javid didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t turn up again either.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Any more no shows \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he missed giving evidence at the business select committee the day before \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and people really will start to talk. It all adds to the accusations that the Tories have not been putting their full weight behind a UK steel industry in crisis.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Labour\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s John McDonnell was quick to pounce on yet another no show by the business secretary. He branded him: \u00e2\u20ac\u015ba waste of space. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s almost as if he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just passing through that department.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rebuke<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

It was mildly better than the Speaker\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s rebuke to Javid after he was hauled in front of the House and forced to make a statement. Speaker Bercow dismissed Javid at the time as \u00e2\u20ac\u015bdiscourteous and incompetent\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In the debate Labour\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Angela Eagle led an onslaught on Tory inaction: 2,000 jobs lost at SSI Redcar, another 1,000 contractors laid off, another 6,000 jobs gone in jobs linked to the steel works.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tata steel flagging up another 1,170 job losses at Scunthorpe, Motherwell and Cambuslang.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Caparo going into administration putting another 1,700 jobs at risk. For every three jobs lost in direct steel employment, three are lost as a result.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The reluctant Tories, said Eagle, had only been pressed into action by Labour backbenchers furious at their feet-dragging. She called for a range of immediate action to protect the steel industry by providing help with energy costs, tackling the dumping of artificially low priced Chines steel, help with business rates which effectively tax capital investment, and using UK steel on UK infrastructure projects.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And she called for a full industrial strategy setting out future demand for UK steel and how the government was going to protect the industry from unfair competition.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\"Jeremy<\/a><\/p>\n

Jeremy Corbyn shows his support<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

She accused the Tories of being seemingly \u00e2\u20ac\u015bunwilling to do anything practical\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 about the crisis and had overseen \u00e2\u20ac\u015bthe effective destruction of its steelmaking assets, including what was the second largest blast furnace in Europe.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sacrificed <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Specialist local skills were being destroyed and the Tories had sat back and watched the effective end of steelmaking in Scotland. There was a real worry she said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bthat the UK\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s steelmaking capacity is being sacrificed on the altar of laissez-faire economics by a government who simply will not act to preserve our country\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s strategic assets.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Labour, she said believes that steelmaking in the UK is an industry of national strategic importance and should therefore be supported by the government.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Steel is important for UK manufacturing as it helps our balance of payments, and it is vital for our defence and security. If we are about to embark on the huge infrastructure investments that the Chancellor is so fond of boasting about, surely we should ensure that\u00c2\u00a0UK steel has every chance to compete and win those contracts.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

To do that, we must ensure that the UK steel industry still exists when those contracts come up for competition.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAs the industry has lurched deeper into this wholly foreseeable crisis, the government have been quick to come up with expressions of sympathy, but noticeably reluctant to take any decisive action,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she continued.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ideological aversion <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt is hard, to avoid the conclusion that the government have been so slow to act because they have an ideological aversion to any\u00c2\u00a0government intervention. We have a secretary of state who will not let the phrase \u00e2\u20ac\u0098industrial strategy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 cross his lips.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe on the Labour Benches support international trade, but free trade must also be fair. China is currently responsible for a tsunami of cheap steel, which is being dumped on European markets. The UK should be at the forefront of demanding rapid and effective action to stop it.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Tories did put up a secretary of state to respond \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but it was the Welsh secretary, Stephen Crabb. His contribution was, to say the least, forgettable, hinging on a complaint that Labour was using steel as a political football.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The business minister Anna Soubry, who is starting to look and sound like she is getting fed up with her no show boss Javid, did her usual tick box list of things the government hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite finished getting around to yet.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But trying to help the steelworkers of Redcar into new jobs is apparently one they have been \u00e2\u20ac\u0098successful\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 at. The Commons was told by local Redcar MP Anna Turley that Subway \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the sandwich maker and retailer had been at the jobs fair.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sandwich makers<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Last week I had been half-joking when I wrote (attacking Osborne) and the lack of response to saving steel jobs at Redcar and elsewhere: \u00e2\u20ac\u015bHis \u00e2\u20ac\u0098march of the makers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 trumpeting manufacturing has become a joke as has his \u00e2\u20ac\u0098northern powerhouse\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be left as the sandwich makers and the skinny latte, almond syrup and sprinkles on top makers.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It was half joking, half serious. And took just two weeks to become a reality.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A northern powerhouse would be brilliant if it were more than an Osborne slogan touted around by a northern powerhouse minister \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Harry Wharton \u00e2\u20ac\u201c branded as a \u00e2\u20ac\u0098clown\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Any more help from no show and sloganising Tories \u00e2\u20ac\u201c overseeing higher paid skilled jobs being replaced by minimum wage sandwich makers \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and the northern powerhouse could rapidly become the northern poorhouse.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But the dwindling band of Tories who actually attended the steel debate were then reinforced by 280 colleagues who turned up to vote down Labour\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s attempt at creating a strategy.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Unite assistant general secretary Tony Burke was appalled at the move. He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe Tories had the chance today to send the clearest signal possible that they supported the steel industry.\u00c2\u00a0 They did not have to vote against the Labour amendment.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWhat a sad end to the debate and for the steelworkers today who go back to their communities after a day fighting for this vital industry, they will do so with a heavy heart.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe will continue to do everything we can to make the case for a better deal from this government for this core sector.\u00c2\u00a0 Today is not the end of this fight, not by any means.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI sincerely hope that the Conservative think again about hailing themselves as the party of the working people as this is now causing anger among actual working people.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Pics by Mark Thomas<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The steel crisis is so important that fewer than two dozen Tory MPs bothered to attend the Parliamentary debate yesterday (October 28) demanding emergency government action. But then again secretary of state Sajid Javid didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t turn up again either.   Any more no shows \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he missed giving evidence at the business select committee the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6535,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[430,269],"wps_subtitle":"Tories vote against steel","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6533"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6533"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6539,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6533\/revisions\/6539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}