Taxpayers should not shoulder the cost of the “failed tactic” of nationalisation, Tory MPs have warned.
They said Sir Keir Starmer’s plans to take steel and rail into public ownership would impose the “burden of the industry’s uncompetitiveness” on Britons.
Mark Garnier MP said: “Nationalising British steel will not solve the industry’s woes – just as nationalising the railways won’t lower fares or end delays. All nationalisation will do is put the financial burden of the industry’s uncompetitiveness on to taxpayers.
“Instead of heaping liabilities onto the public balance sheet, the government needs to address the structural problems the industry is facing.”
Ministers are considering renationalising British Steel in a last-ditch attempt to save thousands of jobs.
It comes amid a standoff between the government and the company’s Chinese owners over a £1 billion investment.
Harriett Baldwin MP said: “Those who don’t learn from history’s mistakes are doomed to repeat them. How many times does Labour have to make the same mistake to learn that nationalisation doesn’t work?
“Our steel industry is clearly in a difficult position and the government must take action to address the challenges it faces. But British taxpayers shouldn’t be made to shoulder the cost of the failed tactic of nationalisation.
“Instead, the government should create a level playing field by pressing ahead with the conservative plan of a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM).
This will ensure that poor-quality, high-carbon steel from China doesn’t flood the market and undercut British steelworks. It is unfair to expect our industry to play by the rules whilst China pollutes their way to success. It is time we created a free and fair market, underpinned by a CBAM, that would enable private steel firms to stand on their own two feet.”
A spokesperson for the Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds declined to rule out nationalising British Steel but said the government had “no plans” to do so.
They added: “We’re working across government in partnership with trade unions and businesses to secure a green steel transition that’s right for the workforce, represents a good investment for taxpayers and safeguards the future of the steel industry in Britain.”
Meanwhile, Labour announced last week that three more operators will be renationalised in 2025.
The Party’s first wave of rail renationalisation means that by the end of 2025, about four in 10 journeys on Britain’s trains will likely be on publicly-owned services.
At present, nearly a quarter of passenger journeys across the country are on services run by companies that are in public hands.
Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander last week could not say what the cost of nationalising rail operators will be but said it would be “a fraction” of what is currently paid in management fees to train companies.
She said: “The primary aim of this is to improve reliability and clamp down on the delays, the cancellation, the waste and the inefficiency that we’ve seen over the last 30 years.
“We’ve had private train-operating companies running train services in this country over the last few decades, and it clearly hasn’t worked.”
Ms Baldwin said bringing the operators into public ownership was a “first step” to a “more integrated and unified railway”, and pointed to the impact of bringing LNER and Southeastern into public ownership.
“So if you look at LNER, for example, we have reduced the number of trains that are cancelled because of staff shortages to basically zero, and we reduced other cancellations to about 5%.
“Southeastern, which is also now in public ownership, is in the top five of train operators for punctuality.”
