UK-based steelmaker British Steel, part of China-based Jingye Group, needs government financial support of about £300 million to keep the blast furnaces at its Scunthorpe plant operating, according to media reports.
The plant is said to be losing £1 million a day amid higher energy costs and will shut down one of its two blast furnaces in the months. The shutdown of the two blast furnaces would lead to thousands of job losses across the country and create a dependency on Chinese steel imports as local production would not be sufficient.
