cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Breaking news on BBC: SSI steel firm goes into liquidation - BBC News
SSI UK (Redcar steelworks) goes into liquidation. Loss of 1700 jobs
- Thread starter cesare
- Start date
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
That was the original idea I think. But the Thai courts have now granted them permission to completely wind up the UK arm.
stethoscope
Well-Known Member
Previous thread here: Redcar Save Our Steel Tonight
Fuck sake though, originally said it was going to be mothballed, and now just going to wind up entirely.
Fuck sake though, originally said it was going to be mothballed, and now just going to wind up entirely.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Sorry, perhaps merge threads?
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
They claim they are going to keep the coke ovens going. Don't see how if they're winding up the UK arm. UK workers to be supported with a grant aid package of up to £80m, mainly for retraining and new small business start-up costs. As if those two things are magic wands that will magically solve these workers' problems.
That waste of space James Wharton MP for Stockton South was on R4 the other day almost ranting that Redcar was going to be mothballed for five years and not being shut.
Shows the minister for the northern powerhouse has his finger on the pulse.
Those sat in Westminster have never realised that even if something is mothballed after five years the manual skills will have gone, like anyother skill if it is not in use it fades away.
You cannot expect someone to return after five years and carry on with the same productivity they had when pushed to one side.
But that argument is now wasted because once again manufacturing is allowed to dissapate because the Tories (I include labour in this instance) cannot abide the possibility that any industry other than finance is viable and needed.
We only matter whilst paying tax and interest. Once you cannot provide that they wash their hands of the sorry mess they and their ilk have made of this once leader of manufacturing.
Shows the minister for the northern powerhouse has his finger on the pulse.
Those sat in Westminster have never realised that even if something is mothballed after five years the manual skills will have gone, like anyother skill if it is not in use it fades away.
You cannot expect someone to return after five years and carry on with the same productivity they had when pushed to one side.
But that argument is now wasted because once again manufacturing is allowed to dissapate because the Tories (I include labour in this instance) cannot abide the possibility that any industry other than finance is viable and needed.
We only matter whilst paying tax and interest. Once you cannot provide that they wash their hands of the sorry mess they and their ilk have made of this once leader of manufacturing.
It should be mothballed because you can't tell what the future holds and really for the state it is loose change. The state could easily nationalise assets like that and maintain them until either its clear they will not be needed, or they can be restarted.
But this kind of stuff is happening all over the OECD nations and has been for a couple of decades. If not for ever. All kinds of different industries.
The OECD nations have already built huge amounts of infrastructure, they might need to maintain it but - outside of war time - they don't need to build it all again in such a (relatively) short space of time.
It isn't some kind of huge success - and the Tories would chuck it all in the sea if they could get away with it - but compare the reaction to this, to the miners in the 1980s. There were no redeployments, retraining, grants etc.
But this kind of stuff is happening all over the OECD nations and has been for a couple of decades. If not for ever. All kinds of different industries.
The OECD nations have already built huge amounts of infrastructure, they might need to maintain it but - outside of war time - they don't need to build it all again in such a (relatively) short space of time.
It isn't some kind of huge success - and the Tories would chuck it all in the sea if they could get away with it - but compare the reaction to this, to the miners in the 1980s. There were no redeployments, retraining, grants etc.
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
This reaction is another nail in the coffin for the UK manufacturing industry, it certainly isn't to be applauded or cheered. Retraining means more skills lost to the area, and to the steel industry as a whole.
the people put out of work would rather have jobs not you pointing out they have it better than the miners did.
No one is applauding it. or saying it's good. It's a tough question. There has been/is a big problem in OECD countries with manufacturing industries, iron, steel, cement, bitumen, brick and so on. What happens when you build your motorway network? Your cities/railway network etc etc. What happens when you make power from the sun and wind and not from coal and oil...
What is your alternative? Right now they are either going to shut it or mothball it.
Last edited:
weltweit
Well-Known Member
I am afraid this is a rerun of what happened in 2010
Redcar's Corus plant
Although at that time there was a buyer, the company that is ducking out now.
How much steel does the UK economy need and where will it come from?
And what else will the laid off workers be able to do for work in the area?
Redcar's Corus plant
Although at that time there was a buyer, the company that is ducking out now.
How much steel does the UK economy need and where will it come from?
And what else will the laid off workers be able to do for work in the area?
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
We need a lot of steel for new power plants of all different kinds, and it has to be a certain type because of the temperature demands on it for steam raising. Cheap Chinese imports flooding the global market may be a short term economic solution but be more expensive longterm due to expensive repairs if it fails.
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
My alternative would be for the Conservative government to grow a pair and properly support UK manufacturing. do you know what one of the first things they did was on gaining power in 2010? They cancelled an agreed loan for Sheffield forgemasters to upgrade one of their furnaces so that they could build reactor housings, the same housing required for e.g. Hinckley point C -which will now probably be imported from China.
how is that that UK government refused to help support a first of kind full scale commercial carbon capture plant because they claimed it would cost too much at £1.5bn but they could underwrite a deal with the Chinese for £2bn for hinckley?
Yeah i dont think that is going to happen re the Tories. You could nationalise a steel plant in the UK, but then you would really need to do the whole lot...
China has a load of spare steel capacity because it has had to build infrastructure. As in had to. Right now it has a whole load of excess capacity, some of which is also going to shut.
But other countries including China are subsidising steel and various other industries and giving them unfair advantages...
The money for CCS isn't happening - generally around the world - because it doesn't work and it makes nuclear waste look positively safe (which it isn't).
China has a load of spare steel capacity because it has had to build infrastructure. As in had to. Right now it has a whole load of excess capacity, some of which is also going to shut.
But other countries including China are subsidising steel and various other industries and giving them unfair advantages...
The money for CCS isn't happening - generally around the world - because it doesn't work and it makes nuclear waste look positively safe (which it isn't).
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
ccs technology has not yet been proven at full commercial scale. That is not the same as not working. Also, Canada and the US are proving it does work for e.g. enhanced oil recovery and smaller size power plants.
yes true, we are sidetracking the Redcar thread tho! cant say i agree on ccs long term but who knows!?
its a very pertinant question - and you can see it all over the EU - what replaces old industries that are no longer there. Does everywhere end up like Cornwall, agriculture and tourism?
its a very pertinant question - and you can see it all over the EU - what replaces old industries that are no longer there. Does everywhere end up like Cornwall, agriculture and tourism?
coley
Well-Known Member
You have to wonder why they still have aluminium smelters, steelworks, coal mines and shipbuilding in Germany though?
And France, though to a lesser degree?
Seems we have an unwritten agreement with our 'EU colleagues' to allow our manufacturing capacity go down the pan as long as our banking and service industries are given free reign?
weltweit
Well-Known Member
I don't think there is any agreement with our EU colleagues, rather there the powers that be have one view about the value of manufacturing industry and here the powers that be have a different view.
Of course if you count the number of cars on the UK's roads that are made in Germany, or for that matter France or Japan, and compare that to the number made in the UK, or Trains for that matter, you have an indication of the implications of the different policies.
German engineers typically earn 3-4 times as much as UK engineers, you have to wonder why Germany values engineers so much more highly than the UK does.
coley
Well-Known Member
Nuclear, 'on the whole' has a good safety record but it's downside is that it's prohibitively expensive, Hinckley point is off the scale in terms of overruns, offshore wind,solar and gas could and should provide the generation needs of the UK and could, at a fraction of the costs of Hinckley and other proposed nuclear generation plants.
coley
Well-Known Member
Ok, to put it more bluntly, the "powers that be, in this country" have all their eggs in the financial sector, so as long as their EU counterparts concentrate on manufacturing and leave the UKs financial sector largely undisturbed then the status quo will continue,
No matter how how much our manufacturing base is destroyed, Redcar is only the latest, look at Alcan in the NE, and Ellington colliery, they didn't even get a mention in the national press
DownwardDog
Riding a Brompton with a power meter.
Chinese people are just as capable of making steel as smoggies. Don't be racist.
Supine
Newt Member
I cant belive that is true. If it is I'm going to start learning German!
weltweit
Well-Known Member
Some 20 years ago I tried to hire a German electronics engineer, it turned out they were earning more than twice (yes, not sure why I said 3-4 times above, perhaps that was bravado and exaggeration) what the same engineer earns in the UK.
So, I don't KNOW if it is still true, and my experience was a sample of one but if you want to find out I would browse some German job vacancy ads. They can't be too difficult to find.
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
Please provide a source for your claim regarding German engineers' pay grade vs UK pay grades.
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
I'm not being racist, so I'd appreciate it if you would retract that accusation. there are a number of instances where Chinese steels have been shown to be sub standard, and below the quality required for certain jobs.
Similar threads
