Harland & Wolff has now formally signed the manufacturing subcontract with Navantia UK for the £1.6 billion Fleet Solid Support ship project.
Under the terms of the subcontract, Harland & Wolff will be responsible for delivering works worth around £700 million – £800 million through the life of the programme. Bath-based BMT will receive fees for their design work but it can be assumed that the remainder of the contract value will go to Navantia. The Spanish company will construct the complex propulsion blocks of the first ship at least, as well as provide the majority of the expertise and technology transfers that will underpin the project.
The works will last seven years and will commence in 2023 and continue until 2031. H&W will be responsible for the fabrication of various blocks including some of the ‘mega blocks’ (blocks incorporating several standard-sized blocks) as well as the procurement of a number of items of equipment to be installed on each vessel in Belfast.
Given Appledore’s experience in the fabrication of the bow sections for the Queen Elizabeth Class aircraft carriers, all three bow sections for this Programme will be fabricated in Appledore prior to being transported to Belfast. All three vessels will have all the blocks assembled, consolidated, fully integrated and commissioned before proceeding to sea trials from the Belfast facility, the first ships to be built in Belfast after over twenty years.
The Belfast and Appledore facilities will undergo a £77 million capital investment programme over the next 2 years. In Belfast, an extension to the fabrication halls will be undertaken to facilitate a material and sub-structure production flow along with efficient manufacturing and production process. Investments will be made in technologically advanced robotic and autonomous equipment that includes material movement, marking, plate cutting, panel lines and robotic welding. In addition, new larger paint buildings will be constructed to facilitate larger and more efficient block painting. Appledore will benefit from upgrades to the shipyard roof along with investments in additional automated machinery that includes the relocation of the existing micro panel line from Belfast.
The partnership with Navantia will further lead to a transfer of technology over the next seven years. Pre-planning applications have already been submitted and demolition works are expected to start shortly in Belfast, with the new facility coming to life over the next two years.
The company will be receiving a significant proportion of the investment required for the recapitalisation plan from the project directly. It will also look to capitalise on production savings with new plant and equipment. It is envisaged that £32m will be financed through additional long-term leasehold improvements, medium-term asset finance and H&W’s proposed new enlarged debt facility with Astra, which is expected to be completed by the end of Q1 2023. There may also be opportunities to access other external funding such as new technology grants and carbon reduction grants that the Company will work through over the next twelve months to maximise funding and optimise the Group’s capital.
In collaboration with its partners in Team Resolute, Navantia and BMT, H&W will continue to engage as a team in future phases of this programme as well as on other opportunities in the UK and globally.
The social value contribution through the life of the programme will include deepening and strengthening the UK supply chain, taking on graduates and apprentices together with technology transfer from Spain to the UK. At the peak of the programme, H&W will be providing employment to over 1,200 personnel (900 in Belfast and 300 in Appledore) and over 100 graduates and apprentices in Belfast and Appledore.
How far we have fallen that the UK has to go to Spain for expertise in ship building? A company that got a wrist slap for breaking EU rules.
The problem is that the existing U.K. shipbuilding expertise is already fully occupied building the T26 and T31 frigates, and Astute and Dreadnought submarines.
Utter nonsense. If that was the case why did Babcock and BAE bid with a UK-wide distributed block build model and integration in Rosyth?
It seems that some yards were ‘batting for both teams’
‘TUK will use a distributed build strategy with several British shipyards participating in the project. The model is similar to the Aircraft Carrier Alliance with Babcock and BAES leading the consortium but with A&P, Cammell Laird and Harland & Wolff all contributing.’
https://www.navylookout.com/details-emerge-of-team-uks-fleet-solid-support-ship-proposal/
Northern Ireland will make a come back harlands will once again after this build navy ships not our fault government run shipbuilding down. Hope after tech transfer we get chance of type 32. If Scotland goes. Belfast has biggest dry Dock in Europe and can take on repairs to 2 aircraft carriers. If sturgeon wants to leave bye.
Scotland won’t be going anytime soon and if it did NI wouldn’t be long getting its own independence referendum. While the majority in both countries would vote remain if they use their brain cells there are too many idiots out there to be trusted with the vote.
There’s a difference between a press release and actualite. You might wish to review the Babcock T31 press releases pre contract award and what actually happened once the contract was in the bag.
Team UKs strategy has always been to collapse the competition through politics. One reason why BMT and RR left the building in the first competition.
At one time the UK used to build a lot of ships. And in my life time that industry has collapsed. We are now buying ships from a yard owned by the Spanish government. A company that fell foul of EU rules on subsidies but got away with it with a mean wrist slap. A yard that a few decades couldn’t have dreamt of building technologically advanced warships. In a country that survives on EU coin. So yes I think I can ask how come we have fallen this far? It is just a general statement. I was speaking about this contract specifically. More that we don’t have the capacity do this work ourselves. I just used the words from the article nothing more.
It’s the neoliberal dream…..the market always wins and if your own yards get out bid and then closed so be it. Unfortunately the rest of the world thinks it’s utter BS and support their own industries, which is why our railways power are all run by state owned companies…just French and German state owned companies…
Exactly.
Are you sure about that? You might want to look at regulation – and entropy, taxes, education and most important country culture concerning industrial work.
The fact is that in UK only industrial work that seems to make the society dream are those in lab coats: hyper advanced stuff or “green” stuff.
I think you will find that those industrial areas that have lost their souls, when industrial capacity was lost..have a different view. The fact that regulation and tax are important parts of a societies wellbeing means that the society you want to live in cannot compete on a neoliberal stage with a society that does not really care…
There is a reason we import all our clothing from second world nations and it’s all driven by neoliberalism….the near slave economy can make stuff cheaper and does not care if it pollutes and destroys its environment…and the neoliberal society will buy it no matter the cost to its own society in lost jobs opportunity and wealth creation, but also happily stepping into a moral void around how something was produced.
I’m not sure it is really neo-anythingism.
As an ardent capitalist and free marketeer I’d call stripping out your own economy stupid.
I’d also call exporting dirty manufacturing elsewhere environmentally dishonest.
Yup, I’d like a clean planet with no toxic messes and you don’t get that by moving activities to unregulated locations and taxing/regulating our native, relatively clean, industry out of business. That just achieves a bigger long term mess.
Hi supportive, there is a bit of a difference between supporting capitalism and the use of the market as an effective tool..and what seems to be an almost slavish approach to the dogma of neoliberalism that says the market has to sculpt everything, that has led to the destruction of some areas of our economy ….somethings are just not really best left to only the Markets and supply and demand ( defence and healthcare and law enforcement are a few examples).
Unanswerable facts. Well said.
Precisely. We have to buy in what we once had because we threw it away. I am glad to find more and more people are waking up to the E.U.’s essential back scratching, wink-wink, culture.
No EU fan from personal career experience over many years – as it’s a political construct and was always intended to be so; though all discussions major on trade – and erstwhile political stability, if you’ll recall.
As a currently contentious example, which spans both camps, the issues affecting Northern Ireland were and still are resolvable to a far greater extent. Focusing purely on this Big Issue of ‘Trade’ the UK possessed one of the most valued & compliant track records within this European Model in all it’s transformational guises over many decades. Yet the long established (by us as much as any other relevant nation) practice of Trusted Trader Status remains under-utilised in this context. If the EU were some paragon of virtue with regard to the movement of goods, very much including food / phyto products and ‘accounting’ for same, then The Resistance observed may be justified – but, hell, it’s not.
All that said, over the same decades and much earlier the UK has significantly over-contributed to it’s own industrial and manufacturing demise; the ‘nation of shopkeepers’ handle being so embraced it’s painful.
Mark-up Without Making has become the Mantra for too many of our Scions of ‘Industry’ – check how many traditional UK brands are now imported from the continent, and anywhere else for that matter. Stuff you would not think even had a major market over there (light-weight, but chosen due to irony of the name; look up Houses of Parliament brown sauce!). All this ‘marks up’ our Deficit in Trade and will need a culture shift – good luck with that, I must add with suitable regret.
Leaving behind above, thankfully, and briefly addressing the issue in this NL article, then. Security issues are progressing so rapidly that we’re gonna need a bigger infrastructure footprint. Thus who has maintained that capacity whilst ours dissolved, and is willing to engage in reconstituting those skills efficiently, gets the Nod.
The problem is that the UK only has a “boutique” shipbuilding industry, kept half alive with orders from the state. Whereas France, Germany and Italy can all build half a million tons of cruise ships in a year without breaking a sweat.
I was watching the Select Committee’s discussion; and on the FSS contract they weren’t a happy bunch about Navantia and H&W’s bid, or maybe more accurately the handling of the level of risk. Navantia (UK) was described as a shell company, which I find believeable, and H&W was painted as a tiny, pretty dodgy company themselves. You can understand their concern about an SME with little track record and that made a loss last year being given a £800m contract, with Navantia, Spain getting the rest.
Just like the committee, I think this is a high risk project, but the risk is that less of it will be built in the UK than was hoped. It’s a bid to build a better design than the other final bids, and if the first ship is mostly built in Spain, I don’t care. If the H&W revival doesn’t happen at all, I’ll be disappointed, but I think the gamble is worth it.
It was quite instructive to see how certain members of the committee had been “briefed” by a certain team that lost.
While Kevan Jones was quite right to highlight the companies structure and financial standing, he was quite wrong to suggest that the companies that went non-compliant should have been given a second chance.
You set up a competition – which by the way will include an extensive compliance matrix against which the competitors self-declare their compliance – make it crystal clear to the competitors that non-compliant bids would not be accepted and you get two out of three non-compliant bids. What he’s suggesting is that you give a specific company / Team a second bite at the cherry, to the detriment of the Team that went in compliant. That’s called fiddling the competition – which is what he was trying to suggest the project team had done in favour of Navantia.
Didn’t discuss the UK input from the designer at all.
TBH, I lost track of who was and wasn’t compliant, and I’ll have to check up what happened to the Damen bid, which seemed to fall through the cracks.
As for BMT, if there’s onward sales of the design, or even if this ship’s win in their portfolio leads to them getting design work elsewhere, that has to be a bonus.
Tex Marshall stated that three bids were submitted (Team Resolute, Team UK, Larson & Toubro) of which one was compliant. There wasn’t a Damen bid. A UK company had bought the rights to a Damen design which they thought would fit the bill. They were wrong – as anyone remotely familiar with the requirement could have told them.
Thank you.
Although, Damen has been subcontracted by Cammell Laird to construct the new Mersey Ferry hull.
Absolutely correct. Spot on as usual.
Absolutely agree. The committee members focused entirely on the build strategy and the competition process. There was no mention of PRICE or which submission was the better design to meet the requirement. The repeated accusation that VAdml Marshall or the MoD had in some way run an unusual or even unfair competition was pretty shameful.
I totally agree with that.
It was another sour grapevine attempt at derailing the contract.
Spellar in particular and Jones are bought and paid for. Spellar has been banging on for years that HMG should just “give the contract to Team UK”, apparently completely unaware that there was no design for them to build, or that they were largely incapable of producing such a design.
That’s before we get to the complete inability of Govan in particular and potentially Rosyth to build the things in parallel with their frigate programmes.
Absolutely true that H&W is a risk – but you’re between a rock and a hard place. On one hand give to an organisation with a workforce but limited additional capacity, or on the other give to an organisation with plenty of potential capacity with time to grow a workforce.
TBH this reads oddly like an H&W press release.
Not the usual highly researched piece I expect on here?
I sincerely hope this works out.
However, there are massive risks with skills etc.
For instance: Appledore way have fabricated QEC bows. However, they were down to one single solitary Bloke onsite two years ago…..I’m not clear how that bloke can carry that forward? Good luck to him!
I’v heard mention that quite a number of the local shipbuilding workforce are commuting to work in Plymouth. H&W shouldn’t have too much difficulty enticing people back, now that they have solid funding behind them and a good few years work lined up.
I would say H & W Appledore have got all the skilled shipbuilding trades available locally already, skilled labour in that industry in North Devon are scarce .
Exactly, a lot of fabricators and welders are contractors. H&W will bring in 100’s from all over the UK to manage the build complete final assembly. The key thing will be ensuring the facilities are in place which they have 2 years to start cracking on.
The article is indeed based mostly on the H&W press release with some of the hyperbole removed. The ‘Current News’ format articles on this site are not intended to be deep research or analysis pieces and are often put together quickly in response to events.
Thanks for the clarification.
A good idea , as people like me arent going to be hunting around everywhere
It’s not perfect, but it’s a lot better than the whole lot going abroad. This was the likely outcome of the first bidding process, when the May government hid behind irrelevant EU competition rules. To me the excitement (hands up as a Belfast local) is in further opportunities utilising the upgraded yard, and this contract will only really be worth it if that happens. For older locals, there is a degree of cynicism about H&W, with large sums invested in the yard in the past that did not spark a renaissance.
Leave it to the experts. H&W is regenerating and we are getting three huge new ships. That is very good news indeed for Belfast and for UK Shipbuilding.
I don’t know who the experts are but I do agree this is a good thing.
I did look up the H&W press release https://www.harland-wolff.com/news/harland-wolff-signs-subcontract-with-navantia-for-fss/
Amusingly the Navy Lookout article does copy and paste large tracts of it, but omits some of the promotional bits and adds some other information.
Anyhow it sounds like a win win situation where UK might get some badly needed technology transfer from another country that has kept more up to date in shipbuilding. It has been so sad to observe the decline of British shipbuilding over my lifetime, I am sure there was plenty of blame to go around beteen the unions, management, government, etc etc as well as the inevitable shift to lower wage countries producers for the more generic ships. But in the aftermath, it is interesting that Europe now builds nearly all the world’s cruise ships and has other niches that a revival of UK shipbuilding should be able to win a share of, and maybe find its own niche markets?
I would like to be optimistic that things can change for the better!
Genuine question rather than a comment disguised as a question.
What work will there be for H&W after these ships are built? Are we going to pay significant one off costs to recruit and train a workforce and improve infrastructure only for that investment to be lost in a few years time when the ships are finished if there is no more work?
It’s a risk, undoubtedly. However – a yard that exists with a workforce and is engaged in delivery has a much better chance of winning work than an empty yard with no workforce.
In terms of U.K. government work the big opportunity for H&W is the proposed replacement of the Albion and Bay class. But longer term the yards management will need to go out and win commercial work.
There should be the ability to bid for the MRSS, which could have 6 ships. For Appledore, there’s the P2000 replacements, possibly some OPVs.
P2000 replacement is for a boatbuilder like Holyhead Marine or potentially MST. They’re way too small for somewhere like Appledore.
Only if P2000 replacement is a ‘patrol boat’. What if the RN decides on something like the Canadian Orca’s or a couple of something like the Leopard-class? I can’t see a one for one replacement.
If they go that way, then P2000 replacements to support URNU they ain’t.
Which means you would need an entirely new requirement – by which I mean, what are the ships for? You also start getting into an entirely different certification regime, which means bring more money.
Really? Boats designed to ‘school young officers’ won’t satisfy the URNU’s need for boats to ‘school young officers’? Whereas repurposed patrol boats designed as patrol boats in the first instance will? Oh…………..And as I said I can’t see all of them being replaced. Never mind not all URNU boats are P2000’s.
But, MRSS shall also go to Rosyth. They have nothing to build after T32 (or before T32, if it is delayed). Rosyth cannot be supported as a sole T3X-builder. Not enough T3X.
Without MRSS order, Rosyth might be forced to cease as being a ship builder. It also applies for H&W. In other words, either will not continue as a ship builder. Windfirm and offshore something, are the main future of the one who lost MRSS bid, to my understanding.
Appledore? No idea. UK already have Cemmel Laird, which must not be forgotten. MROSS(2) and some part of MRSS shall be ordered from them?
There is the follow on for T45 on the horizon I suppose.
Govan is a shoo in for that unless they totally mess up the second batch of the T26.
We shall see. I think it is safe to say that T83 won’t replace T45 one for one.
Donald the 30 year shipbuilding pipeline chart in the national shipbuilding strategy refresh shows a coming into service of something every 5 years from 2031 to 2046. T32 has in service 2031 on the same chart. If the Clyde yards are getting T83, then to me it looks like the gp/light frigates are intended for Rosyth. I think the whole point of the FSSS build going to H&W is to get larger, near commercial type shipbuilding restarted in the UK. H&W have recently done some cruise ship maintenance work. On the same chart are listed future strategic sealift which are Point class replacements I believe a decision on that was supposed to be 2026, but I believe that their replacement date has been pushed back, might they be pencilled in for H&W if they do a decent job with the FSSS ?
Thanks. My point is, after the last T43 deliveed (planned 2038), there is no GP frigates to build. Then, if no MRSS nor Point-replacements, Rosyth has really “nothing” to build, because T31 replacement will not come before 2055 (15 years early replacement? It’s an very old idea from 1970s, which never happened).
My badness, “after the last T43 deliveed (planned 2038),” is “after the last T32 delivered (planned 2038)”. 1-digit shift…
If the 30 year pipeline is to be believed there will be additional frigates with in services dates of 2036, 2041 and 2046. The decision about what form they will take is 2031/2032. The 30 year pipeline chart itself needs a refresh as the National flagship has been binned . The LSD conversion canned in favour of using Argus and the Scottish ferries order went to Turkey. The defence select committee could have directly asked for an update when they had the Secretary of State for defence before them.
And the Northern Lighthouse Board NLV Pole Star replacement went to Spain.
https://workboat365.com/commercial-marine-news/ship-boat-building/northern-lighthouse-board-awards-contract-for-build-of-hybrid-powered-vessel-2/
As I understand the 30 year plan, this is a continous production model for GP frigates with early sales. So each of those dates is the final in-service date of another batch of five frigates. If we get another 5 hulls from T32 or T31B2 and operate 10 GP frigates, the next decision point will commit to an early sell-off of T31B1 along with delivery of the third batch.
There seems to be considerable sceptism on this forum that this plan will pass Treasury scrutiny prior to that 2032 decision point.
Very simple question. Is “44-50%” (700-800/1600) a “significant fraction” in English meaning?
And, if something goes wrong, the fraction will surely decrease? (because Navantia will be coming to help them?)
What is (or is not) significant is wonderfully subjective.
Glad it’s a BMT design, derived from the Tides.
Glad it’s being built in the UK. Not Spain. Not South Korea.
Glad it isn’t going to a BAE-led consortium.
Spread the wealth even if there is some risk.
There will be a good % of hull that will be built in Spain, especially the first ship.
As our good friend n-a-b has pointed out the ‘plans’ when you win the deal often arent what happens in practice.
T45 , T26 and even to some extent T31 ( they originally included H&W !) have all made changes when it came to cutting steel
An article on the first of the French logistics support ship Jacques Chevallier-class having gone through initial seas trials caught my eye. It seems the first hull of the class was primarily built by Fincantieri in Italy, because French shipyards couldn’t deliver in time.
Not just us then.
The first unit was primarily built in Italy because it is based in Italian Vulcano LSS design.
Just bigger 31000t vs 27000t to accomodate the bigger air wing needs of French carriers, so all the issues and proper build process can be defined by those that know it.
There is no french ‘carriers’ … its only one, and much smaller than the UK ‘pair’
The future development is for another ‘one’ to replace it in time- currently merely a ships model. We wish them well.
The French BRF are not just solid support ships like this project but are tankers too. Their existing two tankers will be replaced by the 4 ships of this class
The UKs Tide class tankers are of course bigger again than the BRFs
Much smaller. But has Rafale-M’s in decent numbers, E2’s……..You know aircraft to carry…….. And is nuclear too so lots of range and deep bunkers for avcat……..So………
really ? It seems it normally only carries 24-26 Rafale combat aircraft.
The MN actually does own and operate its fast jets even though they are a derivative of the air force version
yes its nuclear , but the aircraft arent.
Also since they use the French system of low enrichment Uranium , it needs refuelling in dockyard every 5 years
yes its nuclear , but the aircraft arent.
Good grief.
So it does require fuel of the aviation kind , non ?
often carriers take on ship fuel as they can refuel their own escorts
Any comment on the 5yrly refuel of the reactor ?
These ships are being build also for the new carrier. When the new carrier arrives CdG would be still operational.
No it wont.
‘PANG is expected to begin around 2025 and it will enter service in 2038; the year the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle is due to be retired’
https://www.naval-technology.com/features/next-french-aircraft-carrier-to-be-nuclear-powered/
they are still at the study/development phase
The combat aircraft will be around 30..hmmmm. the CdG normally carries only 26
The same evidence is presented each time about the new nuclear carrier but for some reason you ignore it. is that a gallic thing ?
French will make sure there will not be an hiatus , so CdG will operate with new carrier for a time. That is why i said carrier(s). But you keep being obtuse.
Before everyone get’s red faced, one of the major elements of the Navantia side of the show is to train the new workforce in Spain to enable Belfast to have the capacity to put them together. Longer term this means the wonderful but massively underutilized shipbuilding potential in NI is revived. It’s good news. The key is to make sure this investment succeeds in generating more work for the yard.
For a second when you said “the new workforce in Spain”, I thought you meant a new Spanish workforce! I wonder if strong links between Navantia and Belfast can be maintained, and there’s the possibility of H&W getting some subcontracting work from Navantia in the future.
Workforce in Belfast can get dual UK / Irish passports, drive unchecked over the border then fly to work in Spain as required. Unlike any workforce in GB.
They would have visas organised by Navantia , and fly from Belfast.- same goes for the skilled Spanish workers the other way
Their shipyards are at Cadiz, ( main FSSS site) Ferrol and Cartagena
Ireland like UK is outside the Schengen EU travel zone, so would go through Irish customs still
Irish passport holders would not need any “visas organized by Navantia”.
“The Schengen Agreement does not affect the rights of EEA citizens to live and work in other EEA countries. This is covered by EU directives and regulations on the free movement of people.”
All that ROI not been part of Schengen means is that Irish travellers to Shengen Zone “have to show your passport or national identity card” on entry.
Taken from citizensinformation.ie
I hope they know how to align the main propulsion shafts!
Actually, the alignment of shafts is not as easy as it may seem because of the many degrees of freedom to be considered and the need to take account of hull flexing. We used to be good at these things back in about 1912.
Nice a PW reference… i wonder how that crap could happen, even worse in a capital ship. After the SSBN’s this is just the most important ship in the RN fleet.
Requirement to speed up the PoW’s build – some corners cut on QA no doubt.
Off Topic: does the fact that HMS Spey is currently in Ho Chi Min City mean that it also goes into the South China Sea? Didn’t it come from South Korea?