00:00I worked for 22 years in the metals industry before getting engaged in full-time politics
00:04and to watch the industrial decline, unnecessary in most cases industrial decline, is pretty
00:10depressing.
00:11These are the last two blast furnaces operating in the United Kingdom.
00:17They will both be closed by the middle of May unless immediate action is taken.
00:23We would then become the only member of the G20 that doesn't produce primary steel and
00:28we'd be doing that at a time when we're going to increase military expenditure and when the
00:33world is probably in the most uncertain place that it's been at any point during my lifetime.
00:38It would be madness for Britain not to be a producer of primary steel.
00:43There are three days left, three days left to save primary steel production in Britain.
00:51Why?
00:52If the orders don't go in for coking coal, if the orders don't go in for the iron ore pellets,
00:58then the brass furnaces will have nothing to feed them by the end of this month.
01:03Three days to get the orders in and to keep these furnaces going.
01:07And on that basis, I can't see the point of the government upping the amount of money that
01:12it might give to Gingay.
01:14I'm not sure they even want it.
01:15They seem to be quite happy to close it, quite frankly.
01:19There has to be an immediate nationalisation of this plant, an immediate nationalisation
01:25of primary steel production in Britain.
01:27It has to happen before the end of this week.
01:29The orders for those prime commodities have to go in.
01:33And then, once that's happened, Richard will lay out a bit more of a plan for how we see
01:38the future.
01:39People might agree with our plan.
01:41They might have other thoughts on how we go forwards.
01:45What is for certain is if the government don't act by Friday, that is the end of steelmaking
01:50in our country, which, frankly, in the modern world, is unthinkable.
01:54Thanks for being here, now.
02:07Thanks so much.
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