EU PUSH FOR GREEN ENERGY COSTS ANOTHER 1,500 JOBS


Tata’s steelworks in S****horpe yesterday where 1,200 jobs have gone

Saturday May 21,2011
By Sarah O’Grady, Social Affairs Correspondent

PRESSURE on Britain to cut its carbon emissions cost 1,500 jobs yesterday – and they will not be the last, the Government has been warned.

Tata Steel announced the redundancies at its S****horpe and Teesside plants, blaming Â*climate change legislation required by Brussels and the UK’s new Climate Change Act.

The prospect of higher energy costs aimed at reducing carbon emissions by imposing limits would push the price of British steel to uncompetitive levels.

Karl-Ulrich Köhler, head of European operations for Tata, Britain’s largest steelmaker, said: “EU carbon legislation threatens to impose huge additional costs on the steel industry.

“Besides, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about the level of further unilateral carbon cost rises the UK Government is planning. These measures risk undermining our competitiveness and we must make ourselves stronger in preparation for them.â€