Gloomy future for shipbuilding after delay to navy frigate contract

● Union chiefs hit out at ‘body blow’ – but MOD says frigates will still be built

its £250 million price tag for each ship. But it has insisted there are no changes to the plans to procure the first batch of five Type 31e vessels and it still wants the first ship to be delivered in 2023.

But the GMB union said the news was a blow to shipbuilding communities and the SNP said it was “utterly shocking”.

Gary Smith, Scottish secretary of the GMB union, said: “This will come as a real blow to shipbuilding communities in Scotland and across the UK.

“It is an utter shambles, but this is what happens when you have Treasury dominating decisions over sovereign defence capability.”

Richard Hardy from trade union Prospect, which represents more than 700 military and shipbuilding staff in Scotland, also criticised the move.

He said: “The decision is a body blow to many members who are already seeing significant redundancies as the aircraft carrier programme runs down.”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said there have been “no changes” in plans to procure a first batch of five new Type 31e frigates, with 0 Paul Sweeney: Industry needs to be given confidence

the first of them to be delivered by 2023. He added: “This is an early contract in a wider procurement process, and we will incorporate the lessons learned and begin again as soon as possible so the programme can continue at pace.”

The Labour MP for Glasgow North East, Paul Sweeney – himself a former shipyard worker – said that the UK government’s policy on the frigate programme has been cast into doubt.

He said: “Simply leaving it up to industry to come up with a price tag of £250m per ship was never going to work.

“They need to give confidence to industry that they are going to go with a consortium and then they will be able to invest with confidence to get the infrastructure right.”