Saturday 2 April 2016

Tata Steel Confusion

I'm not sure that i understand the Tata steel storm at the moment which is seeing the Steel industry in the UK being decimated.
I get that China have been flooding the market with cheap steel which it is producing in vast quantities but is more than they need in China so they sell the surplus abroad.
Where it loses me is that the EU wanted to increase the tariffs on steel made outside the EU so the Chinese steel price wasn't so attractive to EU members who were snapping it up.
The country that used their veto, three times, was the UK who stated that cheap steel was good as it made the cost of building things cheaper.
Obviously, this had a detrimental effect on British made steel who now faces being closed down as it doesn't have a market.
Confusingly, the British Government are now running around and bleating that British Steel needs to be saved and is 'absolutely vital' for the UK's industrial future and are hopeful 'a new buyer that can take the Port Talbot plant forward could be found' and offering a loan of £100m to sweeten the deal.
Why, if it is so vital, did the Government stop the EU Commission when they said that China was dumping a wide range of steel products in Europe and recommended higher tariffs to help protect similar goods made in the EU.
You don't need a degree in economics to know that it would put the UK Steel trade at risk as people would obviously buy the cheaper steel, therefore helping China at the expense of British industry.
We can only assume that we have been rolled over by our own Government who seem to be bending over backwards to woo the Chinese with one eye on the tens of billions the Chinese are spending on building nuclear power stations in the UK which trumps saving 5,000 UK jobs and costing the British taxpayer £100 million to bribe someone to take over an industry that our politicians have scuppered.
Someone has really dropped the ball on this one.

11 comments:

Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
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Falling on a bruise said...

I will do the same as our Prime Minister and ask the Chinese first and answer accordingly and if that means turfing 5000 British people out of work then i will try and find someone else to blame.

Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
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Falling on a bruise said...

My position I as stated in the very first sentence, confusion over why the government blocked the eu tariffs which was detrimental to our steel industry but now are panicking because the steel industry is being closed down. Who would have thought that!!

Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
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Falling on a bruise said...

Thank you for telling me what I think. That revealing trait you have never gets tiresome luckily.

Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
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Falling on a bruise said...

You do it a lot, i imagine you do it in 'real life' also. Seems to be your thing to tell people what they think and then attack them for it. It's very strange behaviour and shows that actually, you don't 'get it' at all otherwise you wouldn't be trying to draw your own conclusions and then answering them yourself.

Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Liber - Latin for "The Free One" said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Falling on a bruise said...

If i was the British Government i would say protecting our own industry and protecting jobs would trump buying cheaper steel because as we found with the coal mines, once they are gone they are going and we then have to import from abroad. I would have therefore joined the EU wide tariffs.