Cammell Laird 300
FEARS were growing last night that Cammell Laird’s £44m contract to build a new Royal Navy aircraft carrier could be lost.
Hundreds of jobs would be cut at the Birkenhead shipyard if a Government review decides to scrap plans for HMS Queen Elizabeth.
The chief executive of BAE Systems has revealed the firm has been asked by ministers to provide detailed figures on the cost of cancelling the Queen Elizabeth, and its sister ship, the Prince of Wales.
This last minute possible U-turn will rock Britain’s shipbuilding industry as it was believed work on Queen Elizabeth, due to enter service in 2016, was too far advanced to be cancelled.
Cammell Laird officially started work on building Queen Elizabeth’s flight deck, hangars and some accommodation on July 27, at Birkenhead.
A crunch meeting of the National Security Council next week is expected to decide on the fate of the carrier programme and the fast-jet fleet.
