UK: Naval Dockyard in Portsmouth Counts Its Last Days?

The historic naval dockyard in Portsmouth could be closed, bringing to an end 800 years of shipbuilding.

Defence giant BAE Systems is considering mothballing the base which launched ships that allowed Britain to rule the waves for centuries.

Some 3,000 jobs are under threat under the company’s review of its warship business.

Huge cuts to the defence budget as part of the coalition’s Strategic Defence and Security Review means that BAE’s shipbuilding business has a blank order book after work on two new £6billion aircraft carriers is completed in two years’ time.

If the dockyard is closed, it would end a shipbuilding tradition dating back to the start of the 1200s when it was opened under King Richard I.

Today Portsmouth is still home to the Royal Navy. The historic dockyards were bought by BAE Systems in 2009. Now consultants have been hired as part of a study into the future of the company’s shipbuilding division.

The yard is building a 7,000-ton midship section, 5,000-ton stern section and the flight deck control towers for HMS Queen Elizabeth, one of the Navy’s new aircraft carriers. That work is expected to be completed in May.

Next month the yard will begin the same process for HMS Prince of Wales. That should be finished in February 2014.

Sources at BAE said the aircraft carrier contracts would be completed, irrespective of any decision to shut the dockyard. If it is closed, it is likely to cost the taxpayer millions of pounds. The Ministry of Defence has signed a contract which states that it will bear the costs of any shutdown.

Gary Cook, of the GMB union, said the prospect of winning orders to build merchant ships was ‘not great’ because of subsidies paid to firms in other countries, particularly the Far East.

A spokesman for BAE, which also has two yards on the Clyde, said: ‘As part of our business planning activity, we are reviewing how best to retain the capability to deliver and support complex warships in the UK in the future. We will keep our employees fully informed.’

[mappress]
Shipbuilding Tribune Staff, January 23, 2012;