Liberty Group is cutting 350 jobs at two UK facilities, signalling yet more hard times ahead for the British steel industry.
The company announced 282 job cuts at its South Yorkshire plant and 72 at Newport, Wales facility. However, it remains in discussions with trade unions as the two sides work to avert permanent redundancies.
The steelmaker said it decided to slash the jobs after reviewing its UK business operations and realizing current employment levels aren’t in line with its production forecasts.
Cornelius Louwrens, chief executive officer at Liberty, also cited challenging conditions in the UK’s steel industry. The company’s website noted the Newport facility has an annual hot-rolled coil steel production capacity of 1mn mt. Liberty’s Scunthorpe facility is the UK’s largest hot-rolled steel manufacturer of steel merchant bar, with an annual capacity in excess of 400,000mt.