Tata Steel: Hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk, man leading management buyout tells ITV News
Video report by ITV News Correspondent Rupert Evelyn
There are hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk if the UK's steel industry collapses, the man leading the management buyout of Tata Steel's UK assets has told ITV News.
Stuart Wilkie of Excalibur Steel, who has been granted a leave of absence from his role as head of Tata Steel’s Strip Products UK to lead the buyout, told ITV News in his first broadcast interview: "I don't think any longer we're talking about 40,000 jobs in the steel supply chain.
"I think potentially we're talking about hundreds of thousands of jobs if we cannot support an entity in the UK making steel."
Liberty House has also placed a formal bid to buy Tata Steel's UK assets, which include the Port Talbot works in south Wales.
He said many businesses would feel the fallout if the industry collapsed as steel is used in a variety of industries including by car manufacturers, in baked bean cans and electrical transformers.
Mr Wilkie, who has decades of experience in the steel business, denied that the business was now losing £1 million a day.
He said the turnaround plan enacted has "stemmed dramatically that flow of cash" but "every month matters to stop this business across the UK from hemorrhaging money".
Mr Wilkie said they were "ahead of exactly where we said we would be at the end of April, which is crucial".
Mr Wilkie said he sees getting employees to invest in the business as a "moral element".
"What we have to do now is create the new future," he added.