Unanimous Senedd backing for Tata rescue plan as Adam Price calls for nationalisation of company’s Welsh assets

Martin Shipton

Senedd Members from all four parties have unanimously backed a motion calling for an alternative plan aimed at keeping blast furnaces operating at Tata Steel in Port Talbot until new green investment comes on stream.

Tata is losing £1.5m in day on its UK operations and has started a 45-day consultation on a proposal that would see the loss of 2,800 jobs. The UK Government is putting in around £600m to ensure investment by Tata in an electric arc furnace and training aimed at getting new jobs for the workers who will be made redundant

But MSs supported by 54 votes to zero the Welsh Government’s call for a rethink that would allow a longer transition.

Viable future

After the vote in a Senedd plenary session, Economy Minister Vaughan Gething said: “Tonight’s vote sends a strong message from the entire Senedd. There is a viable future for blast furnace steel making in Wales and a better deal could and should be struck for an industry we all rely on.

“The steel industry is part of our nation’s story and stands today as a marker of Welsh excellence. The deal reached between the UK Government and Tata risks delivering an economic loss of historic proportions for Wales within an industry that underpins our manufacturing future and the green jobs it could unlock.

“Senedd Members have come together to send a clear message – there is another way that allows a highly skilled, dedicated workforce to deliver a greener future for Welsh steel. We will continue to engage with the business, trades unions and UK Ministers to support the best deal for steel, not the cheapest deal.”

Plan C

During the debate, former Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price said: “The Secretary of State for Wales [David TC Davies] has said there is no Plan C for Welsh Steel – it’s either Plan A, which is shutting everything, or Plan B which is Plan A by stages and stealth. We need a Plan C. Nobody else is going to come up with it. And we’ve got just 41 days to devise it. So we need to act now with urgency and decisiveness.

“If only we had an Assembly now to defend us, we said in the Miner’s Strike [in 1984-85]. Well, we do have a Parliament now, so what are we going to do?

“Let’s refuse to be resigned to our fate. Let’s refuse to be bystanders at a funeral. Let’s decide to be active agents in shaping our future. So what’s the plan?

“In steel plants across Europe – in Ghent, Duisburg and Dunkirk – we see the alternative. Not mass redundancies, but managed restructuring. Ten year programmes of investment in new technologies like direct reduced iron and green hydrogen, preserving primary steel making for the future.

“To help us get to that future we need an intermediate goal. And that’s preventing blast furnace closure over the next 12 months. Buying us time for a change in the policy and politics at Westminster to build a bridge to a different future.

“If steel can survive until January, no Labour Government will want its demise to overshadow its first 100 days. So first we must appeal to Tata’s conscience to give us more time. The 45 day consultation period ends on March 17, a day after the new [Welsh] Labour leader is announced.

“The new First Minister’s first task should be to fly to Mumbai to speak directly to Tata’s Indian leadership. [Former First Minister] Carwyn Jones camped outside their Board meetings in 2016. We need that same energy now. All the better if the new FM has a bankable promise from Keir Starmer in his back pocket.

“If Tata remain implacable, we should offer to buy their Welsh assets for their current ‘book value’ of a dollar. They won’t want to do that as they don’t want the competition.

“That gives us three options. Option One is doing nothing. Option Two is literally buying time by guaranteeing losses for the coming financial year, up to a maximum say of £400m, maybe in return for a minority stake. Much of that could be drawn down through our borrowing powers over two successive years, with the remainder from the reserve and with a contribution from the local authority. A 30 year bond at 4-5% would cost no more than the tax receipts that would be lost through closure.

“If Tata refused, then we could threaten to pass emergency legislation to force the compulsory purchase of Tata’s Welsh assets. The Senedd’s lawyers have confirmed that nationalisation to save the Welsh steel industry could be within our competence. This would almost certainly be challenged by Tata but even this would give us an injunctive power to stave off immediate closure. And it could unlock a negotiated sale as a going concern that could help Welsh steel survive intact over the next crucial 12 months.

“These ideas are novel and untested. But in unprecedented situations that’s precisely what you need. They are not without risk. But neither is doing nothing.

“So here’s an appeal to the outgoing First Minister. Test these ideas today with those with experts to see if they might work. Ask your own lawyers. Ask the Mondragon co-operative’s consultancy [from the Basque Country], or the unions’ advisers Syndex.

“We may not have the power to save Welsh steel alone. But we do have the power to delay its demise.”