Kemi Badenoch risks Downing Street row after saying ‘nothing is a given’ when asked about whether the UK should always have a steel industry

• Kemi Badenoch said she needed to look at steel from a business perspective
• Read more: Kemi Badenoch blasts gender self-identification

The new Business Secretary yesterday appeared to question if the UK should always have a steel industry.

In her first interview since being appointed to the job in Tuesday’s reshuffle, Kemi Badenoch said: ‘Nothing is ever a given.’ But the comments risk putting her on a collision course with Downing Street.

Maintaining a steel industry has been expensive for the Government in recent years as firms have demanded significant bailouts to retain jobs.

Last week British Steel, owned by a Chinese company, was said to have drawn up plans to cut 800 jobs. Ministers fear the fallout from skilled jobs being lost in industrial areas.

The new Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch said ‘nothing is ever a given’ in regards to the steel industry 

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Mrs Badenoch said she needed to ‘sit down and look at what exactly has been going on with steel from a business perspective and an industry perspective’. She also told Sky News that fixating on the short-term damage caused by Brexit was a ‘fake conversation’.

The minister added that not enough time had been spent ‘talking about what we can do with having an independent trade policy’.

She added: ‘So I’m not surprised a lot of people are feeling “Bregret” because there are many other economic background factors, that have nothing to do with Brexit, which can make people feel bleak.’

Steel is also considered a strategic industry as it is used in the manufacture of ships, weapons, railways and large-scale infrastructure.

Miss Badenoch, seen as a potential successor to Rishi Sunak at the head of the Tory party, was this week handed a new role as Business and Trade Secretary.

The position will assume the responsibility of domestic businesses and regulation that was previously carried out in the sprawling Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy department.

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