Corus workers arranged a march to demonstrate against planned job cuts.

Corus workers have organised a demonstration about the thousands of planned job cuts across Corus plants, as Europe’s second largest steel producer, announces its intentions to cut a further 366 roles.

Last week, Corus announced further job losses as part of proposals to “improve the competitiveness of its Scunthorpe site”.  It said it needed to align employment costs with anticipated steel demand, and as such up to 366 jobs have been identified “as being at risk.” Though it said it will seek voluntary redundancies to lessen the impact.

At the time of the announcement, Unite’s National Officer for the steel industry, Terry Pye, said: “We will be seeking urgent discussions with Corus on this latest announcement of a further 366 job cuts at its Scunthorpe site. Unite’s priority is to minimise redundancies. We will not accept any compulsory redundancies and will be doing everything possible to support our members.”

Unite has now announced there is to be a planned protest on Saturday (18 July) at Redcar, North East England, to campaign against further job losses. In a statement released today detailing the demonstration it said: “This is in response to news that some 2,000 workers are under threat since a consortium of companies pulled the plug on a 10 year purchasing contract.”

According to the union, a consortium of companies has reportedly withdrawn from a 10 year purchasing contract, forcing uncertainty for many workers’ livelihoods.