Tata Steel to cut 3,000 European jobs due to excess supply, high costs

The company says there will be no plant closures; the aim is to ensure long-term future

Tata Steel plans to cut around 3,000 jobs across its European operations as it wrestles with excess supply, a source close to the discussions told Reuters on Monday. Earlier, the group’s European chief executive Henrik Adam said Tata was planning to announce job cuts across the European business, which employs around 20,000 people, but did not give figures on job losses.

Following a meeting of Dutch employees, a source told Reuters around 3,000 jobs would go and details would be worked out over the coming weeks.

A Tata spokesman had no immediate comment on the number.Indian-owned Tata Steel, which launched a transformation programme in June to strengthen its European business, has operations including steelmaking in the Netherlands and Wales and downstream operations across Europe.

There will be no plant closures but the aim is to shield the company against the “huge number of challenges” it faces, Tata said.”We are working hard on our plans to be operationally cash positive,” Adam said. A company spokesman confirmed Adam’s comments originally made to the Financial Times newspaper.Steel making in Europe has come under strain from international competition and high energy costs, putting large numbers of well-paid jobs under threat.

European steelmakers blame China for the extent of a surplus in the market, but the world’s biggest steelmaker says it has made its own deep cuts to capacity. Britain last week said Chinese steelmaker Jingye has signed a provisional deal to buy British Steel, which went into compulsory liquidation in May.