Several thousand steel cookers demonstrated on Friday for the preservation of their jobs during the planned conversion to climate-friendly production. "Germany remains an industrial country with green steel" or "Steel workers for jobs and environmental protection" could be read on banners with which the workers in heavy industry pulled in front of the headquarters of Thyssenkrupp Steel Europe in Duisburg. They demanded financial support from a new federal government for the transformation of the industry, which also includes corporations such as ArcelorMittal, Salzgitter and the steelworks from Saarland. "We want to write something in the record book for politics and the parties," said IG Metall-NRW boss Knut Giesler to Reuters. “We need an investment and transformation fund,” he added. The new federal government must act.

North Rhine-Westphalia's new Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst also spoke out in favor of preserving the steel industry in Germany.

"We have to do everything so that we can continue to produce steel competitively in Germany," said the CDU politician on Friday at an IG Metall rally in front of several thousand trade unionists in front of the headquarters of the Thyssenkrupp steel division in Duisburg.

It was his first major public appearance after being elected Prime Minister on Wednesday

It is about reconciling climate protection and industry, said Wüst.

“If we really want to do something for the climate, then we can only do that if we show the world how to get good jobs, prosperity and social security.

Because otherwise nobody in the whole world will imitate us. "

IG Metall called for a nationwide day of action on Friday under the motto “FairWandel - social, ecological, democratic”, which also includes the rally in Duisburg.

IG Metall wants to set an example for the coalition negotiations.

Events were planned at over 50 locations, the largest of them in the government district in Berlin.

The union expects a total of around 50,000 participants.

Transformation of the industry

A new federal government must “make the transformation of the steel industry a focus of its work in the first 100 days,” demanded the German Steel Federation, in which the companies in the sector are organized.

"It is good and right that the steel workers point this out emphatically as part of the IG Metall day of action," declared the president of the association, Hans Jürgen Kerkhoff.

Like the aluminum, cement and chemical industries, the steel industry is one of the largest CO2 producers in Germany.

IG Metall and employee representatives fear that the steel companies will not be able to compete with competitors outside the Union due to the EU's climate protection goals.

The planned renovation would cost billions more that the corporations could not manage on their own.