Stelco lays off 85 more workers as steel industry workforce shrinks

HAMILTON — Stelco Holdings laid off 85 employees at the end of last week, according to union leader Ron Wells.

The week before, he says the company issued 90 layoff notices.

In late September, the U.S.-owned steelmaker announced plans to lay off up to 500 workers at its operations in Hamilton and Nanticoke, Ont., blaming the Canada-U.S. trade war.

READ MORE: Canada loses 68,000 jobs in September as steel dispute escalates

READ MORE: Stelco layoffs in Hamilton signal risk to Canada's steel industry, union says

"To make a ton of steel nowadays, you need a lot fewer people," Wells, president of United Steelworkers Local 1005, told CBC News. "Now, it’s a lot more streamlined."

According to Statistics Canada, direct employment in Canada's primary steel manufacturing industry has slipped from nearly 29,000 workers in 2003 to about 14,000 workers as of July.

Wells, a 47-year veteran of Stelco, says the workforce at Stelco alone was about 14,000 strong when he started working for the company.

According to U.S. regulatory filings, the total workforce of Cleveland-Cliffs, the Ohio-based owner of Stelco and North America’s largest producer of flat-rolled steel, shrank from about 30,000 employees to roughly 25,000 between Dec. 31, 2024, and Dec. 31, 2025.

This year of job cuts included about 600 layoffs in Dearborn, Mich., as Cleveland-Cliffs idled a massive blast furnace.

CEO Lourenco Goncalves blamed soft demand from North American automakers.

The move prompted another 600 cuts in Minnesota to align the company’s raw ore output with reduced blast furnace demand.

The layoffs have provoked a clash between Stelco and the federal government over the company’s obligations under the Investment Canada Act to maintain a certain number of workers in Canada.

In a letter to Industry Minister Mélanie Joly obtained by The Canadian Press, Stelco president Paul Simon complained that imports of cold-rolled and coated steel accounted for 45 per cent of market share for those products.

Yadude Books reported in October that the company's president said Canadian exports of some steel to the U.S. have fallen 58 per cent.

Wells says Ottawa is not doing enough to shield Canadian producers from cheaper foreign imports.

"There’s too much capacity coming from offshore," he said. "It dilutes the price in Canada."

A new forecast from research firm Wood Mackenzie predicts U.S. steel production will rise about 4.5 per cent this year, even as demand in America shrinks.

Senior research analyst Tiago Vespoli sees a different reality in store for Canada.

"The increase in U.S. steel tariffs to 50 per cent has significantly disrupted … established trade flows, creating a situation in which U.S. steelmakers can increase production and market share, while Canadian producers face growing pressure on export volumes and capacity utilisation," he wrote on Thursday.

Wells says he’s encouraged by a recent uptick in spot prices for galvanized steel, a product Stelco is pivoting away from in Hamilton.

"Galvanized steel is now at $1,800 a ton in Canada, which is a vast improvement from six months ago. That’s why we find these layoffs and the idling of the cold mill and coated [steel] quite puzzling. It seemed like [prices for] coated products were starting to rebound," he said.

He said he believes the layoff is partly to pressure Prime Minister Mark Carney to secure a trade agreement and to make U.S. President Donald Trump look good ahead of midterm elections by showing his tariffs are working.

Goncalves has openly supported Trump’s tariff agenda, a fact that has prompted blunt criticism from Joly and Carney.

With a courtroom clash between Cliffs and Ottawa looking increasingly likely, Wells says he continues to hold onto hope that Stelco will recall the workers being laid off.

"It's hard to take them at their word anymore, to be honest with you," he said.

"I strongly believe these layoffs are temporary. I think this trade situation will get sorted out soon and our members will get back to work."

Stelco’s workforce isn’t the only cohort of Ontario steel workers facing job uncertainty.

Last December, Algoma Steel issued layoff notices to about 1,000 workers, nearly a third of its workforce.

While the Sault Ste. Marie, Ont.-based company blamed U.S. tariffs for crushing its export competitiveness, the announcement coincided with plans to fast-track its transition to greener and less labour-intensive electric-arc furnace production.

That came after ArcelorMittal Long Products Canada announced the permanent shutdown of its Parkdale wire-drawing facility in Hamilton in June 2025.

"Despite our best efforts, the ongoing economic challenges, increased steel imports in Canada and market conditions made it clear that we needed to reduce our operating footprint," company spokesperson Jean-Philippe Grou told CBC News at the time.

With files from The Canadian Press and CBC News