In a response to BusinessLine ’s interview with Roy Rickhuss of the Community Union in the UK who has called for a third party to review industrial relations at the company, Tata Steel said, “any initiative to improve the effectiveness” of its partnership with unions, including working with third parties, deserved “consideration”.

Challenging times At a time when its’ long-term strategy was paying off despite “very challenging economic circumstances,” it was critical for the company to maintain and re-establish sustainability across the board, a spokesperson for Tata Steel said in an e-mailed statement.

“To do this we need our industrial relations to be stronger than ever before.”

The spokesperson said that the modified pension scheme satisfied both a ‘healthy majority” of employees’ concerns and the company’s need to address the scheme deficit, currently estimated to be £2 billion.

The deficit would also be dealt with through other actions to be discussed with the trustee of the scheme.

Pressures on steel makers Tata Steel re-emphasised the pressures on it, and the pension scheme. Exports from China were eating away steelmakers’ margins, while the strength of the pound and the high cost of energy in the UK had hit industry hard.

Earlier this week, four unions representing around 12,000 Tata Steel workers in the UK voted in favour of a new offer from the company to keep its defined benefit pension scheme open, with some modifications, thereby averting the biggest industrial dispute in the British steel industry in three decades.

Also read: Union calls for independent review of industrial relations at Tata Steel in UK

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