Corus sheds another 366 jobs at Scunthorpe site in UK

Europe's second-largest steel maker and Tata Steel's European subsidiary, Corus Plc, is shedding 366 jobs at its Scunthorpe site in North East England, citing plunging demand for steel and high employment costs.

The Scunthorpe site has lost 25-per cent of its workforce in about seven months. 500 jobs were eliminated last month at the Scunthorpe site, when Corus axed 2,000 jobs at the UK and 45 in the Netherlands on 24 June. (See: Corus to shed another 2,045 jobs)

Corus said that the latest round of job cuts would improve the competitiveness of the plant, and aded that the company would seek voluntary redundancies wherever possible, while at the same time ensuring that critical skills are retained and support packages made available to those leaving the company.

The job cuts will affect those employees working in the company's manufacturing department.
The Scunthorpe plant, a part of Corus long products division, makes sections, wire rods and plates, which are mainly used in the construction and automobile sector and both these sectors, are witnessing plunging sales, the worst decline since the past ten years.

Corus, which employs 2,400 people at 36 sites in Britain and Ireland, provides over two-thirds of Tata Steel's European output.

But due to steel demand melting globally, Corus had mothballed two blast furnaces at its Scunthorpe and Port Talbot plants and may shut its Teesside plant after a consortium backed out from a 10-year purchasing agreement to lift around 78 per cent of Teesside's 3.5 million tonnes production every year. (See: Consortium deal pull out may hit 2,000 jobs at Corus)