A provisional EU steel safeguard announced by the European Commission yesterday has been welcomed by UK Steel. The safeguard is in response to the recently imposed US Section 232 steel tariffs introduced earlier in the year.
UK Steel director general Gareth Stace commented: "These measures will shield UK steel producers against a surge of imports as a result of President Trump's unnecessary and unwelcome Section 232 tariffs," he said, adding that free trade must prevail.
"We believe that the WTO-compliant measures taken today strike the right balance between maintaining the principle of free trade and shielding the interests of our steel producers against a surge of imports as a result of Section 232."
Mr Stace said that the top priority for the UK Government should remain working with the EU to secure an exemption from what he called 'these absurd tariffs'. "In the meantime we are pleased to see action such as this which supports our steel industry and ensures that, as a result of Trump, we do not slip back to the dark days of the worst steel crisis in over a generation in 2015/16," he added.