A group of Conservative politicians have called for mining giant Anglo American to rethink its “catastrophic” plan to slow down work on a multi-billion pound fertiliser mine in North Yorkshire, which the group says could lead to a large number of jobs being cut.
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00:00Hello, I'm Michael Crosland, Business Reporter with the Yorkshire Post, here with the news
00:05this morning that a group of Conservative politicians have called on mining giant Anglo
00:10American to rethink its plan to slow down work on a multi-billion pound fertiliser mine
00:16in North Yorkshire. The group have said that they believe the plan could lead to a large
00:22number of jobs being cut. The group, which includes Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen, described
00:28the move as catastrophic and said that they had heard locally that Anglo American was
00:33moving quickly to demobilise contractors and put staff on notice. Anglo American announced
00:39a slowdown of activity across its crop nutrients business and wider Woodsmith project earlier
00:45this month. The firm has now confirmed that the changes would have a direct effect on
00:50its business workforce and team of contractors and that it would announce further details
00:55of the plan in June. Construction on the Woodsmiths mine, which is located near Sneaton
01:01to the south of Whitby, started in 2017 with Anglo American taking over in 2020. The project
01:09employs around 2,000 people. The news comes after Australian multinational mining and
01:16metals firm BHP announced yesterday that it was walking away from a deal to take over
01:22Anglo American after being unable to reach an agreement. The companies had been in talks
01:28over a deal worth around £39 billion since last Wednesday. That's all we have for the
01:34time being, I'm Michael Crossland reporting for the Yorkshire Post.