Around 500 workers will be made redundant at Australia’s second-largest steel mill, administrators and lawmakers said on Monday.
Whyalla Steelworks in South Australia is currently searching for a new owner after falling into administration last year, and it will shut its blast furnace with most workers made redundant, administrators KordaMentha said.
“The blast furnace represents the old technology that no steelmaker wants anymore. That blast furnace essentially had no value to the new owner,” South Australia Premier Peter Malinauskas told a news conference.
The steel plant was placed in administration last year, with its operating company owing tens of millions of dollars to creditors, forcing the state and federal government to come up with an A$1.9 billion ($1.36 billion) bailout package.
The sale process was on track to be completed by the end of the year, Malinauskas said.
Malinauskas previously named the two remaining bidders as Brisbane-based M Resources and India’s Jindal Steel JINT.NS.
($1 = 1.3994 Australian dollars)
(Reporting by Alasdair Pal in Sydney; editing by Lincoln Feast.)
