Mersey shipyard clinches £180m aircraft carrier deal

Jul 1 2008 by Bill Gleeson, Liverpool Daily Post

A BIRKENHEAD shipyard is in line to build parts of Britain’s next generation of aircraft carriers.

The former Cammell Laird shipyard has been approved as a “second-tier” supplier to the main contractors of the £3.9bn contract to build two 55,000 tonne vessels.

The HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales are ex-pected to have a 50-year service life, launching in 2014 and 2016.

The details about North-western’s supplier status emerged yesterday as the shipyard opera-tor unveiled details of a huge contract to maintain and service 11 Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA) ships for the Ministry of Defence.

Northwestern chief executive John Syvret said: “Over recent months we have been tendering to become a second tier supplier to the aircraft carrier alliance, and I am pleased to announce that we have been awarded that status and we are now a second tier supplier.

“We'll be competing against lots of competition and I am hopeful in the future that we will be success-ful in undertaking some of that work for the aircraft carrier alli-ance. We were awarded the second tier status about six weeks ago.”

BAE Systems and VT Group have been named as the lead con-tractors for the construction of the aircraft carriers, but it has al-ways been anticipated that large parts of the work will be subcon-tracted to other shipyards. North-western has the advantage of own-ing a huge indoor ship construc-tion facility on the banks of the River Mersey.

Mr Syvret has no clear idea of the value or the scale of the aircraft carrier work that could come to Birkenhead, but added: “We have a very comprehensive list of tender documents that we have to go through and appraise but I am very optimistic that we will see some of that work in the future in the shipyard.”

The Ministry of Defence and Northwestern yesterday confirm-ed details of a contract that will see the Birkenhead yard service and maintain a variety of RFA vessels, including fuel tankers, munition ships and hospital ships that service the Royal Navy’s fleet of warships.

The initial contract is worth £180m and runs for five years. If performance targets are met, the contract is expected to be extend-ed for another 25 years, and its lifetime value could rise to £1bn.

The deal provides Northwestern with a reliable flow of work and offers the MoD savings of £330m over three decades. Currently the RFA vessels are maintained and serviced by several UK shipyards on an ad hoc basis. Another five vessels will be maintained by A&P Group, in Southampton.

The contract announced yester-day secures the future of North-western’s shipyard. Mr Syvret said it will allow them to develop a business that can go on to win more work from other sources.

He said: “This underpins the business long-term. It provides stability for our workforce.

“This allows us to make capital investments in our infrastructure and to invest in training and provides long-term benefits for the local community.”

Mr Syvret said the deal would create some new jobs, but was unable to say how many.

Angela Johnson, commercial ship maintenance category team leader for the Royal Fleet Auxil-iary, said Northwestern had beat-en four other yards to secure the contract, adding: “Northwestern put in an exceptionally strong bid both on skills and competencies.

“This was not just about price.”

billgleeson