AnalysisSome major questions on British Steel left unanswered – and many more to comepublished at 10:27 British Summer Time

10:27 BST

Jack Fenwick
Political reporter

Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds (middle aged man with grey hair and grey/white beard) sitting down on a red chair wearing a dark blue suit, white shirt and burgundy tie. Sitting in front of him, with her back to the camera, is presenter Laura Kuenssberg (mediul length blonde hair and dark green dress) sitting in a matching red chair

There were two striking things from that interview with Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds.

Firstly, he couldn’t confirm that the government would be able to keep the blast furnaces at Scunthorpe running.

The urgent need for raw materials that feed those furnaces was the very reason the government chose to step in.

But Reynolds repeatedly refused to guarantee that the new coking coal would arrive in time.

He was also asked about the cost of nationalisation to the taxpayer.

While he was keen to stress that the market value of the company is effectively zero, there could clearly be some pretty hefty costs when it comes to running the plant.

The business secretary couldn’t put a number on those costs this morning.

That’s largely because – if nationalisation does happen – we don’t know how long it will be for.

Ministers clearly want to find a new business partner for British Steel in the private sector.

But as we’ve been reporting this morning, that won’t be easy – and until it happens, taxpayers may well have to foot the bill.

Expect ministers to be repeatedly questioned in the coming weeks about what exactly that means for the amounts of public cash involved