King Canute has cut short an Easter break, where he pretended not to be posh, to fly home to deal with the steel crisis. You see the sky is falling in and chicken little pretends that by calling an emergency summit he can fix it just like that. It is all make believe of course. This is the fantasy world of Call Me Dave where our super-hero has to be see rolling up his sleeves and doing something.
The problem is that Tata wants to leave the UK steel business as it is losing money hand over fist. What can Dave do to save 15,000 jobs in the welfare safaris? History shows that he will consider chucking taxpayer cash down the pan to ease the problem. Sure he might save a few jobs, pro tem, but it is an incredibly expensive way for a Government running a huge deficit to make a point.
The reality is that steel in the UK like the coal mines of old or British Leyland - ie. just not economic. Once upon a time the Conservative party believed in market forces and would have accepted that but with the Euro referendum looming Call Me Dave wants to buy support wherever he can, whatever the cost for UK taxpayers.
Of course CMD could take action to make either Tata reconsider or make its assets attractive to other buyers. Firstly he could announce that the UK will impose a tariff on foreign steel being dumped on the UK at below cost prices thanks to subsidies from overseas Governments. Yes we are talking China here. Free trade makes the world a better place but not if some folks cheat with subsidies. Stiffing the Chinks with a tariff might breach EU rules about aking unilateral action but it is not me arguing that being in the EU is good for British jobs is it?
Secondly, we could end the ludicrous levies we suffer in the UK on power use in order to subsidise all our la la land alternative energy production targets. That way we would stop putting factories which are big users of power at a massive disadvanage to rivals in Europe and across the world. It is the actions of politicians doing too much with daft green taxes that have caused the crisis in steel.
A real Tory would realise that but sadly our Prime Minister is Mr David Cameron