Liberty House completes acquisition of steel mills

Liberty House has announced that it has completed the acquisition of two former Tata Steel plate mills in Lanarkshire.

The deal involved the Scottish government buying the plants in Motherwell and Cambuslang from Tata and immediately selling them to Liberty.

The Clydebridge and Dalzell steel processing mills were mothballed by Tata several months ago.

Liberty boss Sanjeev Gupta has said he hopes production can restart by the end of the third quarter this year.

A total 150 jobs are expected to be created in getting both mills back up and running, with the possibility of further posts once production ramps up.

Earlier this month, Mr Gupta received the keys to the plant in an official handover ceremony.

Liberty House boss Sanjeev Gupta said he was pleased to announce that the deal had been completed

On Thursday, he said: "We're very pleased to announce that we have completed the deal to acquire Tata's plate mills in Scotland and we now look forward to continuing to work with local management and the workforce to rebuild these great businesses in the months ahead.

"We're very grateful for the valuable support of the Scottish government and the trade unions in concluding this deal.

"Our team are continuing to evaluate the opportunity to make a bid for other Tata UK assets."

'Delighted'

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon welcomed the development.

She said: "I am delighted that the final details of the deal to transfer the Scottish steel plants is now concluded and implemented.

"We are very grateful to Liberty for their foresight in coming forward to take up this exciting opportunity in Scotland and for the energetic and speedy manner in which they worked with the Scottish government to help save these jobs.

"We look forward to working very closely with them in the future."

The Scottish government set up a steel task force after Tata announced it was mothballing the plants, in an effort to find buyers for the sites.

Scottish Business Minister Fergus Ewing, who chaired the task force, said: "Over the course of eight taskforce meetings and a lot of other engagement we made significant progress in five key areas to support the industry, namely business rates, energy costs, environmental issues, skills and procurement.

"It has been a team effort which has paid off and once again the steelworkers of Scotland will produce world-class products from Lanarkshire."