UK Steel - Submission to the Steel Strategy: The plan for Steel

31 March 2025

Britain has a long and proud history of steelmaking, and today, the industry supports over 34,000 jobs and world-class British manufacturing. The country is in a prime position to lead the world in Net Zero steelmaking as the UK sits on an abundance of steel scrap resources critical to the circular economy.

Steel is a foundation industry, literally the building block of our society, feeding into everything from construction to transport, critical national infrastructure, defence, energy pipelines, wind turbines, household goods, food packaging, and medical, industrial, and agricultural equipment. Steel is the bedrock of the UK’s supply chains and is fundamental to the future of the UK economy, our economic resilience and national security. The industry supports thousands of jobs and communities both directly and indirectly along the supply chain, particularly in Wales and the North East of England.

Steel is also central to any ambition to decarbonise the UK economy – a meaningful decarbonisation, not through deindustrialisation and offshoring emissions, but by actually taking responsibility for the emissions of our steel consumption. With its infinite recyclability, steel is an essential component of a circular economy, generating thousands of green jobs and powering the decarbonisation of other sectors, too. It is used in every single technology that a green economy relies on, from wind turbines and solar panels to electric vehicles and hydrogen infrastructure.