About the session
The speaker discusses the investments and improvements made by Tata Steel and Tata Group in its UK operations following the previous owner’s short-term view of the businesses driven by producing quick investor returns. Tata Group is the biggest foreign investor in the UK today, employing 45,000 people with revenues of £11bn. The speaker praises the resurgence of the UK automotive sector, which has provided a welcome boost for his company at a time when the recession and Eurozone crisis has weakened demand for European steel. However, he expresses his dismay over the failure to create a coherent manufacturing strategy for the UK’s growing offshore wind energy industry which has led to potentially lucrative steel contracts were being lost, with wind turbine towers being imported. Reports say that as little as 10%, and at most 30%, of the value of a wind farm is manufactured in the UK.
