Royal Navy Type 31 Frigate Order

[jbswagger]

Royal Navy Type 31 frigate order goes to Babcock
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-bu...

[HarryW]

Be interesting to see the final price....

Designed in Denmark, tweaked in the UK, equipment predominantly from France, Holland and Germany. But assembled in Scotland and perhaps NI.
Great for the UK, not so sure?

[anonymous-user]

Long term it’s good. All the upgrades, re-fits etc have to be done in the UK guarantees work for the ship yards, the actual build isn’t that important however, the RFA ships proved that they can be made overseas and then sensitive kit fitted at a later date.

[Condi]

Hopefully the design can secure some export orders as well, which has to be a good thing for UK ship building.

One of the main contractors for the build is Ferguson shipyard, currently owned by the Scottish government and with 2 CalMac ferries sat there.

[Lurking Lawyer]

Condi said:

Hopefully the design can secure some export orders as well, which has to be a good thing for UK ship building.

Is it though? I was under the impression that any of order of any size would be likely to be on the basis of simply using the design but being largely or wholly built locally, as with the Aussies and T26?

I suppose we can live in hope!

I still think 5 is too few - but then that was just as true for T45 and the projected T26 build.

[silverfoxcc]

Any Rumours on what they might be named?

[Flooble]

Broke, Bankrupt, Bust, Beggared and Bereft?

[Taffer]

pablo said:

Long term it’s good. All the upgrades, re-fits etc have to be done in the UK guarantees work for the ship yards, the actual build isn’t that important however, the RFA ships proved that they can be made overseas and then sensitive kit fitted at a later date.

They're to be built in the UK, it's just going to be based on an existing foreign design. Unlike RFA (merchant) vessels, Royal Navy ships have to be built in UK yards.

[HarryW]

Islay
Orkney
Skye
Mull
Arran

[Condi]

Flooble said:

Broke, Bankrupt, Bust, Beggared and Bereft?

Our defense spending is still 7th in the world, including behind places like Saudi Arabia and Russia who spend far more of their GDP on defense than we do.