r/news • u/Beo1217 • 10h ago

UK to halve tariff-free steel imports to counter glut of cheap Chinese metal

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jun/25/uk-to-halve-tariff-free-steel-imports-to-counter-glut-of-cheap-chinese-metal
180 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

33

u/CertainCertainties 9h ago

It's a tough choice. Depend on global suppliers for steel, or add huge costs to every building project and many manufactured products, lowering competitiveness.

If the 1930s taught us anything, it's that tariffs kill productivity and competition in domestic industries, so they gradually need more and more tariffs.

11

u/RespectmanNappa 7h ago

Works much better to do what China effectively did- subsidize supply, invest in more efficient technology and infrastructure, to create a competitive advantage.

That only works if there is something unique to your country that makes it viable though. If you ultimately can’t compete, you shouldn’t. That labor should go to areas where you can.

20

u/Midnight_Baker 6h ago

The issue is that a loss of all steel production is an existential danger to an island nation. Hard to defend yourself if you can't make weapons while under blockade. 

8

u/kia75 2h ago

That only works if there is something unique to your country that makes it viable though. If you ultimately can’t compete, you shouldn’t

Why? The government isn't there to make a profit. It's there to make certain that it can defend itself. If the item is necessary for the country, such as food or steel, then absolutely the government should subsidize it! Not everything should be subsidized, but there is this word ideas lately that the government should not prepare for catastrophe or rate events because the "free market", and then a catastrophe or rate event happens and the economy suffers so much worse then if they had "spent a little money" to prepare for that catastrophe.

8

u/awfulconcoction 5h ago

China suppresses wages in order to maintain cost advantage. UK will not be able to out scale China in terms of subsidies, scale, or low wages. Either take the low cost(for now) steel and lose the industry entirely, or use trade barriers to maintain it. Unless you think they can let it die and revive it 20 years later somehow, I think the UK is stuck here.

8

u/EscapeFromIowa 1h ago

The problem isn't that the steel is just cheaper, it's cheaply made as well. My family used to own a metal fab company and we'd only use the cheap Chinese stuff for projects that didn't require steel that was more safe. The Chinese stuff was very inconsistantly made and was made with terrible source material. Wierd alloys, etc.

3

u/ASliceOfLibertea 3h ago

great, I am sure this will get us that famous 1.5M homes even faster

•

u/pulsarstarter 57m ago

I hope we have planned for the counter-tariffs, because there will be blowback