Tony Pedder has paid the price for Corus' woes

Corus said that in light of the firm's performance a change in leadership was required, and that chief executive Tony Pedder had resigned with immediate effect.

The company announced a net loss of �458m ($733m) for 2002. Operating losses before one-off items were �393m, up from �377m the previous year.

The future of Corus was thrown into doubt on Thursday after the company's management lost a court battle to allow part of the business to be sold.

The funds were needed to cover the costs of restructuring at the firm.

Job cuts

Turnover fell to �7.19bn from �7.7bn in 2001, with Corus blaming the global economic slowdown and the strength of the pound against the euro for the drop in sales.

Sir Brian Moffat does not have the trust of the workforce in either the UK or the Netherlands. We demand that he must go now Michael Leahy, Iron & Steel Trades Confederation

The company's debts stood at �1.24bn at the end of 2002, with asset sales having managed to cut the debt burden by �324m last year.

Corus said its losses continued to come from the UK despite recent attempts to improve competitiveness.

"It is clear... that Corus' UK losses have got to be reversed and this will inevitably lead to significant further capacity reductions and concentration of operations onto fewer sites," the firm said in a statement.

Earlier in the week, Corus warned that it was set to close more plants in the UK, with the loss of up to 3,000 jobs.

The three plants seen as most vulnerable are at Redcar on Teesside, Scunthorpe in North Lincolnshire and Port Talbot in South Wales.

Tony Poynter, the union representative for the Redcar plant, told the BBC that despite the losses the firm's outlook was not bad, and closing one of the plants would be a mistake.

"We believe that Corus' strategy to close a site is wrong - they should maintain the three major sites."

Mr Poynter said that recent currency movements - with the pound weakening against the euro - should help the company's exports, and global demand for steel was picking up.

Bust-up

Thursday's court battle was the result of a row between the UK and Dutch sides of the business over the planned 750m euro sale of two aluminium plants to France's Pechiney.

The UK arm of Corus was relying on the cash to help pay off part of its debt mountain and cover the cost of restructuring.

The future of the Teesside plant is in doubt

But the court ruled that Corus' Dutch supervisory board had the right to block the sale to Pechiney and it threw out claims from the company's own management that the Dutch custodians had acted irresponsibly.

Following the row there has been speculation that Corus, created through the merger of British Steel and the Dutch firm Hoogovens in 1999, could end up splitting in two.

But chairman Sir Brian Moffat said on Friday that there were no plans for a demerger.

Chairman under pressure

Following the departure of Mr Pedder, Sir Brian said he would delay his planned retirement.

But unions called for Sir Brian to step down as well.

"Tony Pedder has done the honourable thing in resigning but he must not be a scapegoat, " said Michael Leahy, general secretary of the Iron & Steel Trades Confederation.

"Sir Brian Moffat does not have the trust of the workforce in either the UK or the Netherlands. We demand that he must go now."

Following the results announcement, Corus shares stood fractionally higher and ended the day up 1.5 pence at 5.5p.