Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025

Baroness Hunter of Auchenreoch Excerpts

Thursday 23rd October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hunter of Auchenreoch (Lab)]

My Lords, I am delighted to be following our newly appointed Peer and Minister, my noble friend Lady Lloyd, and I am most grateful to the usual channels for allowing me to do so. It is quite something to be standing at the Dispatch Box to make one’s maiden speech, never having been a parliamentarian before, and to do it so skilfully and eloquently. My noble friend has had a stellar career to date, in a wide range of jobs here and overseas, where people co-operate, deals are made and business gets done. She will bring all that wealth of experience to her role in your Lordships’ House.

I was my noble friend’s—or even Lloydy’s, as she was then—first boss. She is one of our Guildford three, along with James Purnell and Tim Allan, close schoolfriends, ferociously intelligent, who from 1990 came at various periods in their university holidays to work in Tony Blair’s office as researchers. She joined us permanently in 1993 aged 23, and stayed the entire course, one of the most consequential individuals of the Blair Administration.

My noble friend can grasp and synthesise detail, conscious of the bigger picture. She is not noisy or showy, but firm and straight, clear and crisp. She still has the face of an angel, but she also has—I hope I can get away with it in this debate—balls of steel, the late Baroness McDonagh’s famous pre-requisite for success in politics. We have all been on the end of my noble friend’s withering look, including, many times, Tony Blair, who said of her that

“most of all she was so transparently honest and fair to everyone that she exerted a calming influence on the madhouse”.

She will very soon discover that this House is of a very different order from that one, as I learned in the British Steel debate on Saturday 12 April this year, when I was a very new Member of the House and when the commitment to today’s debate was made.

I was pleased then that the Government acted so decisively on what became a historic day. It was the first time I had been present for a debate in its entirety and, like me, my noble friend will come to appreciate the depth and spread of knowledge of noble Lords and the dignified and respectful nature of our exchanges. I advise my noble friend to listen to the many experienced people on all sides of the House. Some she may disagree with, but she will learn a lot from them, as they will surely learn from her.

My own contribution to this debate is not born from steel expertise, although I am familiar with the industry’s vital importance through my work at BP and Anglo American, and my association with Tata Steel when I was working at the Royal Academy of Engineering. I have declared these interests in the register.

The deal the Government struck with Tata over Port Talbot last year, as my noble friend said, involved £500 million of investment to support the transition to electric arc furnaces, better terms for workers, and £50 million of investment in the local community to help people learn new skills and support the supply chain. This has ensured the site’s long-term sustainability. My noble friend Lord Murphy will, in his own inimitable way, advocate much better for Port Talbot than I.

I was very pleased that the Act was passed with such strong cross-party support in April. I was proud that this House recognised the urgent need to safeguard national capability, as well as thousands of skilled jobs in Scunthorpe, the UK’s only remaining production capacity for making primary, or virgin, steel, which is essential for infrastructure, defence and energy projects. The Act extended beyond just saving the steelworks; it also began to set out a clear long term-vision for ensuring that the UK retains its sovereign capability. As many noble Lords have argued before, reliance on a volatile global supply would expose the UK to significant economic and security risks.

I commend the Government for standing up for UK steel-making and seeking a pragmatic commercial solution which supports decarbonisation, safeguards taxpayers’ interests and protects jobs—up to 34,000 direct jobs and 42,000 in the supply chain. I was cheered recently to read that British Steel is enrolling its first apprentices in over three years. As I have said, I have spent much of my working life in the engineering sphere and I will always advocate for it. Engineering is essential in steel production, and, in turn, steel is the backbone of civil engineering. The relationship is symbiotic. The steel industry is not just a supplier of raw material; it is a driver of engineering progress.

Regions with strong steel industries often become hubs of engineering excellence, fostering apprenticeships, innovation and advanced manufacturing. I used to do a talk in schools entitled “Naked in a Field” to highlight the prime importance of engineering. I could have said the same in relation to steel. Without either of them, there would be no buildings, bridges, skyscrapers, railways, wind turbines, pipelines, factories, machinery or tools.

Steel’s essential integration into every major engineering discipline makes it vital to national development, technological innovation and the transition to a sustainable future. Steel will be essential in the precision engineering of the new generation of small modular nuclear reactors, especially the reactor pressure vessel. The industry supports a highly skilled engineering workforce, including metallurgists; structural, mechanical, electrical and chemical engineers; mechanical designers; and process engineers. The Royal Academy of Engineering has in place R&D partnerships between academia, government and the steel sector.

I warmly welcome this Government’s commitment to supporting the future of our steel industry. Although I understand the phrase “considering all options” during this process of consultation, I urge Ministers to come forward sooner rather than later with their promised steel plan and its place in the Government’s 10-year industrial strategy. Many present and future engineering jobs depend on it.

I am looking forward to hearing from my noble friend Lord Stockwood, today’s other new Minister, also making his maiden speech from the Dispatch Box. I do not know how it works when a Minister closes a debate with his maiden speech, but in lieu of anyone following him to recognise his first outing, I warmly welcome my noble friend and know that he will be a tremendous asset to our House, as will my noble friend Lady Lloyd.