Australia's largest steelmaker BlueScope Steel Ltd has confirmed it is to reduce overtime and the number of contract workers and casual employees in its efforts to save $150 million across all operations by June 30, 2009.
BlueScope managing director Paul O'Malley would not quantify to what degree cost-saving measures would affect the workforce at Bluescope's Port Kembla base, which includes 4,686 full-time workers plus contractors.
Mr. O'Malley said, "The target is not one of reducing labour, it's one of reducing costs," stating that the company was already forced to reduce its reliance on contractors at Port Kembla, resulting in about 50 redundancies in the region.
BlueScope Steel, which recently announced a reported profit of $407 million for the first half of fiscal year 2009, has predicted what would be its first-ever loss in the second half of the financial year if demand for steel continues to decline due to the financial crisis.