Liberty Steel has appointed four new directors to “accelerate the restructuring and refinancing” of the troubled business.

The shake-up could involve selling off poorly performing parts of the company, whose employees have been facing uncertainty after the collapse of its main lender Greensill in March.

Sanjeev Gupta, whose GFG Alliance business empire controls Liberty, last month promised its 3,000 UK workers that on his watch, none of its steel plants would close.

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In April, business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng told MPs that ministers had resisted giving a £170m taxpayer bailout to Liberty, citing fears that money could be shifted to Gupta assets overseas.

Liberty said in its latest announcement that it was making progress on refinancing – confirming a deal to shore up its Australian arm – and that high steel prices had helped Liberty’s core business maintain a strong performance.

The company, which employs more than 30,000 people worldwide, said its new four-man restructuring and transformation committee (RTC) would “protect and maximise creditor and stakeholder value”.

Liberty said: “The RTC will be given full autonomy to restructure Liberty’s operations to focus on core profitable units, and either fix or sell underperforming units.”

The appointments include US-based turnaround specialist Jeffrey Stein as chief restructuring officer and London-based Jeff Kabel, a former JP Morgan executive who previously lobbied the government on behalf of the steel industry, as chief transformation officer.

Mr Stein and Mr Kabel are being hired in independent interim roles, to be paid fees but not becoming Liberty employees.

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Dubai-based Iain Hunter and Deepak Sogani are the other two appointments.

Mr Hunter, a former chief executive at Mr Gupta’s Wyelands Bank, will become chief governance officer and Mr Sogani will be chief financial officer, also taking the CFO role on an interim basis at parent company GFG.

Mr Sogani replaces V Ashok “who has decided to step down for personal reasons”, Liberty said.

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