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The owners of Britain’s second-biggest steel producer are seeking an urgent package of financial support from taxpayers amid renewed fears for thousands of industrial jobs in the north of England.

Sky News has learnt that Jingye Group, which bought British Steel out of insolvency in 2020, has told ministers that the company’s two blast furnaces are unlikely to be viable without government aid.

British Steel, which is headquartered in Scunthorpe, north Lincolnshire, employs about 4,000 people, with thousands more jobs in its supply chain dependent upon the company.

The request from Jingye poses a major headache for Jacob Rees-Mogg, the new business secretary, on the eve of the Conservative Party’s annual conference in Birmingham.

While the precise scale of the support being sought by the Chinese industrial group was unclear this weekend, insiders suggested that it would need “hundreds of millions of pounds” to keep the Scunthorpe blast furnaces operational.

It was also unclear whether any financial subsidy would be in the form of a loan or grant.

One insider said that Jingye was prepared to make thousands of people redundant if ministers rejected its request.

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It would then plan to import steel from China to roll at British Steel’s UK sites, according to the insider.

This weekend, the government confirmed that it was “working at pace with the company to understand the best way forward as it seeks to secure a more sustainable future”.

“We recognise that businesses are feeling the impact of high global energy prices, particularly steel producers, which is why we have announced the Energy Bill Relief Scheme to bring down costs,” a spokesman for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said.

“This is in addition to extensive support we have provided to the steel sector as a whole to help with energy costs, worth more than £780m since 2013.”

Industrial consumers of energy have complained for months that soaring prices are imperilling their ability to continue investing, with continuing uncertainty about the duration and cost of a recently announced government subsidy scheme.

For Mr Rees-Mogg, who took over as business secretary less than a month ago, a decision over government support presents a politically undesirable menu of choices.

If no state funding is made available and significant numbers of jobs are axed, it would undermine a key tenet of the ‘levelling-up’ strategy that became a doctrine of Boris Johnson’s administration.

An agreement to provide substantial taxpayer funding to a Chinese-owned business, however, would almost certainly provoke outrage among Tory critics of Beijing.

China’s role in global steel production, after years of international trade rows about dumping, would make any subsidies even more contentious.

A British Steel spokesman said: “We are investing hundreds of millions of pounds in our long-term future but like most other companies we are facing a significant challenge because of the economic slowdown, surging inflation and exceptionally high energy and carbon prices.

“We welcome the recent announcement by the UK government to reduce energy costs for businesses and remain in dialogue with officials to ensure we compete on a level playing field with our global competitors.”

It is the second time in little more than three years that serious doubt has been cast over British Steel’s future.

In May 2019, the Official Receiver was appointed to take control of the company after negotiations over an emergency £30m government loan fell apart.

British Steel had been formed in 2016 when India’s Tata Steel sold the business for £1 to Greybull Capital, an investment firm.

As part of the deal that secured ownership of British Steel for Jingye, the Chinese group said it would invest £1.2bn in modernising the business during the following decade.

Jingye’s purchase of the company, which completed in the spring of 2020, was hailed by Mr Johnson as assuring the long-term future of steel production in Britain’s industrial heartlands.

“The sounds of these steelworks have long echoed throughout Yorkshire and Humber and the North East,” he said.

“Today, as British Steel takes its next steps under Jingye’s leadership, we can be sure these will ring out for decades to come.

“I’d like to thank every British Steel employee in Scunthorpe, Skinningrove and on Teesside for their dedication and resilience which has kept the business thriving over the past year.

“Jingye’s pledge to invest £1.2 billion into the business is a welcome boost that will not just secure thousands of jobs, but ensure British Steel continues to prosper.”

Tata, which owns the vast Port Talbot steelworks in Wales, remains Britain’s biggest steel producer.

It, too, has sought government support in recent months, with the Financial Times reporting in July that the Indian-owned group was seeking £1.5bn of taxpayer funding to help it decarbonise its operations.

Liberty Steel, the third-biggest player in the industry, saw a bid for £170m in state aid rejected last year by Kwasi Kwarteng, the then business secretary.

As chancellor, Mr Kwarteng will play a key role in determining the fate of Jingye’s request for support.

This weekend, it was unclear how quickly a decision would be reached by ministers or whether advisers had been drafted in to help negotiate on either side.

A government insider pointed out that a range of support schemes aimed at heavy industry remained operational.

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Barclays fined £40m over ‘reckless’ financial crisis capital raising

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Barclays fined £40m over 'reckless' financial crisis capital raising

Barclays has been fined £40m over capital raising that averted its need for taxpayer aid during the 2008 financial crisis.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) found that the bank should have disclosed more details to the stock market about the £11.8bn in funding, from Qatari and other sovereign investors, that it had previously described as “reckless” and lacking integrity.

The penalty followed a protracted investigation that began in 2013 but was held up by criminal proceedings brought by the Serious Fraud Office that led to the acquittal of all defendants charged, including Barclays.

A decision by the bank not to refer the FCA’s enforcement case to an Upper Tribunal meant that the watchdog’s planned fine could be imposed.

Its regulatory action concerned Barclays’ navigation of the events of 2008 when the-then Labour government took huge stakes in major lenders, including Lloyds and RBS – now NatWest – to prevent a collapse of the banking system.

The FCA said of its action: “The events in 2008 were of national importance as banks sought emergency recapitalisation.

“The FCA has a primary objective to ensure market integrity. Banks should treat their obligations to the market and shareholders seriously.”

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Barclays was yet to comment.

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‘When you hit profits, you hit growth’: Businesses criticise biggest budget tax increase in decades

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'When you hit profits, you hit growth': Businesses criticise biggest budget tax increase in decades

Tax rises announced during the recent budget will hit businesses rather than encourage growth, the head of one of the UK’s most prominent business groups will warn on Monday.

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) has joined a choir of voices opposing Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s fiscal measures, which the Labour Party claims are needed to plug a £22bn “black hole” left by 14 years of Tory government.

Labour put growth at the heart of their campaigning during the last general election, but business believe the £40bn tax rises announced last month – the largest such increase at a budget since John Major’s government in 1993 – will stifle investment.

Rain Newton-Smith, who heads the CBI, is expected to say at the group’s annual conference in London that “too many businesses are having to compromise on their plans for growth”.

She will say: “Across the board, in so many sectors, margins are being squeezed and profits are being hit by a tough trading environment that just got tougher.

“And here’s the rub, profits aren’t just extra money for companies to stuff in a pillowcase. Profits are investment.”

Ms Newton-Smith will add: “When you hit profits, you hit competitiveness, you hit investment, you hit growth.”

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), which monitors the government’s spending plans and performance, has previously said most of the burden from the tax increase will be passed on to workers through lower wages, and consumers through higher prices.

Last week, dozens of retail bosses signed a letter to the chancellor warning of dire consequences for the economy and jobs if she pushes ahead with budget plans.

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Up to 79 signatories joined British Retail Consortium’s (BRC’s) scathing response to the fiscal announcement, which claimed Labour’s tax rises would increase their costs by £7bn next year alone.

It warned that higher costs, from measures such as higher employer National Insurance contributions and National Living Wage increases next year, would be passed on to shoppers and hit employment and investment.

The letter, backed by the UK boss of the country’s largest retailer Tesco, said: “The sheer scale of new costs and the speed with which they occur create a cumulative burden that will make job losses inevitable, and higher prices a certainty.”

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From October: ‘Raising taxes was not an easy decision’

‘Businesses will now have to make a choice’

A few days after the budget, Chancellor Reeves admitted she was “wrong” to say higher taxes were not needed during the election campaign – as she warned businesses may have to make less money or pay staff less to cover a tax increase.

But she claimed the previous government had “hid” the “huge black hole” in finances and she only discovered the extent of it once her party was voted in.

She told Sky News’ Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips: “Yes, businesses will now have to make a choice, whether they will absorb that through efficiency and productivity gains, whether it will be through lower profits or perhaps through lower wage growth.”

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ITV back in spotlight as suitors screen potential bids

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ITV back in spotlight as suitors screen potential bids

Potential suitors have again begun circling ITV, Britain’s biggest terrestrial commercial broadcaster, after a prolonged period of share price weakness and renewed questions about its long-term strategic destiny.

Sky News has learnt that a number of possible bidders for parts or all of the company, whose biggest shows include Love Island, have in recent weeks held early-stage discussions about teaming up to pursue a potential transaction.

TV industry sources said this weekend that CVC Capital Partners and a major European broadcaster – thought to be France’s Groupe TF1 – were among those which had been starting to study the merits of a potential offer.

The sources added that RedBird Capital-owned All3Media and Mediawan, which is backed by the private equity giant KKR, were also on the list of potential suitors for the ITV Studios production arm.

One cautioned this weekend that none of the work on potential bids was at a sufficiently advanced stage to require disclosure under the UK’s stock market disclosure rules, and suggested that ITV’s board – chaired by Andrew Cosslett – had not received any recent unsolicited approaches.

That meant that the prospects of any formal approach materialising was highly uncertain.

The person added, however, that Dame Carolyn McCall, ITV’s long-serving chief executive, had been discussing with the company’s financial advisers the merits of a demerger or other form of separation of its two main business units.

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Its main banking advisers are Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Robey Warshaw.

ITV’s shares are languishing at just 65.5p, giving the whole company a market capitalisation of £2.51bn.

The stock rose more than 5% on Friday amid vague market chatter about a possible takeover bid.

Bankers and analysts believe that ITV Studios, which made Disney+’s hit show, Rivals, would be worth more than the entire company’s market capitalisation in a break-up of ITV.

People close to the situation said that under one possible plan being studied, CVC could be interested in acquiring ITV Studios, with a European broadcast partner taking over its broadcasting arm, including the ITVX streaming platform.

“At the right price, it would make sense if CVC wanted the undervalued production business, with TF1 wanting an English language streaming service in ITVX, along with the cashflows of the declining channels,” one broadcasting industry veteran said this weekend.

“They would only get the assets, though, in a deal worth double the current share price.”

Takeover speculation about ITV, which competes with Sky News’ parent company, has been a recurring theme since the company was created from the merger of Carlton and Granada more than 20 years ago.

ITV said this month that it would seek additional cost savings of £20m this year as it continued to deal with the fallout from last year’s strikes by Hollywood writers and actors.

It added that revenues at the Studios arm would decline over the current financial year, with advertising revenues sharply lower in the fourth quarter than in the same period a year earlier because of the tough comparison with 2023’s Rugby World Cup.

Allies of Dame Carolyn, who has run ITV since 2018, argue that she has transformed ITV, diversifying further into production and overhauling its digital capabilities.

The majority of ITV’s revenue now comes from profitable and growing areas, including ITVX and the Studios arm, they said.

By 2026, those areas are expected to account for more than two-thirds of the group’s sales.

This year, its production arm was responsible for the most-viewed drama of the year on any channel or platform, Mr Bates versus The Post Office.

In its third-quarter update earlier this month, Dame Carolyn said the company’s “good strategic progress has continued in the first nine months of 2024 driven by strong execution and industry-leading creativity”.

“ITV Studios is performing well despite the expected impact of both the writer’s strike and a softer market from free-to-air broadcasters.”

She said the unit would achieve record profits this year.

ITV and CVC declined to comment, while TF1, RedBird and Mediawan did not respond to requests for comment.

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