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British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

bbc.com

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Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#101

Post by XorNot »

Deukhoofd wrote: post #44
0x3f wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can make this same argument about a great number of things. Why is steel any more critical than food or vaccines or the like? Indeed we got caught short of vaccines recently, and had some nontrivial consideration of running a military op against NATO member over it.

Food tends to be a lot easier to produce, and many countries do often subsidize their food production, as well as have mercantilistic policies to ensure food production is kept locally. Vaccines is a more interesting one, and would be something that might indeed be of interest to a nation. On the other hand I don't think many governments are that concerned about another pandemic, sometimes the discourse regarding it…

Vaccines aren't something you need urgently in a crisis.

A wartime effort has to keep supplies moving daily, or the front collapses.

Whereas the need for vaccines is heavily deferred - your population is already vaccinated in peacetime, and you are unlikely to need to make a novel vaccine over the course of a war, nor vaccinate new population during one either: that large vaccinated population providing herd immunity gives you a lot of runway for children with less access.

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#102

Post by pjc50 »

traceroute66 wrote: post #93
nialv7 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what a bizarre article, completely disconnected from reality. in what world is manufacturing, a sector that has been neglected for decades at this point, having any sway on politics in Britain. why does The Economist have so much disdain of manufacturing and people who work in it? look at China, look at their manufacturing industry and what they are able to do with it. then look at the UK, who is struggling to build…

> look at China, look at their manufacturing industry and what they are able to do with it. "look at China" what ? Have you seen the population size of China ? Have you seen the geographic size of China ? Remember what is often said when Mr Trump talks about bringing tech manufacturing back to the US .... Yes great idea Mr Trump. But even with the most generously optimistic figures, due to the lack of available workf…

> Have you seen the population size of China ? Have you seen the geographic size of China ?

British thinking seems to be that because we won the Opium War we should just expect a country with 20 times our population and a vast land area to be poorer, both per capita and in total, than our island, forever.

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#103

Post by timcobb »

georgeecollins wrote: post #92
pydry wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is a large war, those countries will prioritize domestic consumption and the UK will immediately stop being able to produce weapons. Domestic steel production is an essential element of being sovereign, as opposed to being the handpuppet of a larger power (like the US).

Really? There is a large war going on right now and the key material is chips. Drone don't use a lot of steel, neither do missiles or modern airplanes. Yes you need artillery and particularly shells. But you are so much more limited by the capacity of your munition factories that how much steel you have would not be an issue. One of the main things you would need for a new munitions factory is trained workers. The Wo…

Drones are only part of the equation you need to be able to forge things

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#104

Post by 0x3f »

pjc50 wrote: post #89
0x3f wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they do, actually. They just have a disconnect about it. But e.g. removing the triple lock is unpopular not just among those of an age to be affected by it.

The triple lock actually benefits everyone not currently retired, just .. not until they actually retire.

Only if you assume it's sustainable until you personally die. But that seems in constant question even now.

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#105

Post by hylaride »

georgeecollins wrote: post #92
pydry wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is a large war, those countries will prioritize domestic consumption and the UK will immediately stop being able to produce weapons. Domestic steel production is an essential element of being sovereign, as opposed to being the handpuppet of a larger power (like the US).

Really? There is a large war going on right now and the key material is chips. Drone don't use a lot of steel, neither do missiles or modern airplanes. Yes you need artillery and particularly shells. But you are so much more limited by the capacity of your munition factories that how much steel you have would not be an issue. One of the main things you would need for a new munitions factory is trained workers. The Wo…

You can't occupy territory with drones (yet). You will need people and moving people in a drone-infested environment will mean protecting them with armoured vehicles. Yes, these vehicles will need enhancements and other new tech to counter drones, but armoured vehicles aren't going away (MAYBE the tank's days are numbered, though).

If you are really interested in this, I highly recommend subscribing to war on the rocks. Their articles and paid podcasts have legit defense industry people publishing studies on this subject. https://warontherocks.com

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#106

Post by pjc50 »

lysace wrote: post #97
pjc50 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that manufacturing is a relatively small part of both the economy and the job market; AND the popular view of manufacturing (large plant staffed by a large number of men being the dominant employer of a nearby town or city) doesn't look anything like the reality of modern manufacturing (small run boutique high value stuff like satellites and turbines, highly automated and professionalized, relatively sma…

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2026/jul/14/university... Thousands of university job cuts in humanities and social sciences are creating widespread cold spots for languages, classics and theology degrees, the British Academy has warned. [...] The subjects with the biggest staff cuts were social work (-9%), English and classics (both -8%), anthropology (-7%) and linguistics (-6%).

https://www.centreforcities.org/reader/town-and-gown/univers...

"Universities brought in an estimated £24 billion to the UK economy from abroad in 2022. They provide services (education) to international students who bring money to the institutions from abroad through international fees. These students also bring money to the local economy by spending on goods and services while they are studying"

(presumably there's an attempt to imply that those are bad courses in some way, but you haven't shown your working)

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#107

Post by pjc50 »

0x3f wrote: post #104
pjc50 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The triple lock actually benefits everyone not currently retired, just .. not until they actually retire.

Only if you assume it's sustainable until you personally die. But that seems in constant question even now.

This is true, but .. for all retirement planning, you kind of have to assume no-collapse. It's also incoherent to say "the government pays too much attention to retirees" and "I expect to be defrauded by the government when I retire, along with my entire generation, and to be powerless to stop this" at the same time.

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#108

Post by nephihaha »

intheitmines wrote: post #64
msuniverse2026 wrote: post #18

Interesting how they haven't repeated in this article earlier claims that the Chinese purchase of the steelworks was a strategic move to slowly destroy the blast furnaces by letting them cool under pretext of low demand.

See also Chinese companies buying UK private schools and closing them down Original: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/07/02/chinese-company-... https://archive.is/dRQsB#selection-2155.4-2155.79 Choice quote from the article Mike Parker, the school’s director of marketing, wrote on LinkedIn: “Whatever you read, this isn’t a VAT story. It isn’t a ‘falling rolls, unstoppable decline’ story. The truth is deeper and…

UK private schools spent decades ingratiating themselves to Eastern European gangsters, Arab tyrants and the scions of Asian oligarchs probably including CCP kids. China-pandering has also undermined university education, although the individual Chinese students tend 5o be okay.

I suppose you reap what you sow.

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#109

Post by 8note »

traceroute66 wrote: post #93
nialv7 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what a bizarre article, completely disconnected from reality. in what world is manufacturing, a sector that has been neglected for decades at this point, having any sway on politics in Britain. why does The Economist have so much disdain of manufacturing and people who work in it? look at China, look at their manufacturing industry and what they are able to do with it. then look at the UK, who is struggling to build…

> look at China, look at their manufacturing industry and what they are able to do with it. "look at China" what ? Have you seen the population size of China ? Have you seen the geographic size of China ? Remember what is often said when Mr Trump talks about bringing tech manufacturing back to the US .... Yes great idea Mr Trump. But even with the most generously optimistic figures, due to the lack of available workf…

the US and china are basically the same size geographically though? and the US federally owns tons of land it can create manufacturing cities out of

Re: British Steel taken into public ownership to protect 'vital' UK supply

#110

Post by 8note »

p_l wrote: post #45
mr_toad wrote: post #39

The government is forced to sell steel at a loss, because all the buyers for whom this is a such a vital supply would otherwise buy cheaper imported steel, every single one of them . And ultimately all the ore and coke used to make the steel are imported anyway.

Until something happens that disrupts the supply chains from abroad and suddenly there's an issue

if theres supply chain disruption abroad, its probably going to affect the ore and coke exports too
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