New Britannia could set sail for £250m
A BUSINESSMAN who has spent £420,000 of his own money on plans for a replacement for HMY Britannia is offering to raise £250million privately to build the ship as a tribute to Queen Elizabeth II and bring in billions of pounds in trade for Britain.
Ian Maiden, who made his fortune in outdoor advertising, led one of 19 consortia that put in bids to the Ministry of Defence to build the new national flagship over a year ago.
The winning design was due to be unveiled in May but is now stalled-because Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has put Britain’s defence budget under strain.
Liz Truss, the new Prime Minister, said in July that she hoped the ship – enthusiastically supported by her predecessor Boris Johnson – will now be funded by private donors.
Mr Maiden said he knew of “four or five” high-net-worth individuals who could fund the construction of a new flagship, as long as they are given the signal to step in by central Government.
He said: “I can get four or five people who will come up with the funds.
“These are major household names in international trade in different spheres of activity. They will be falling over themselves to support the project as a trade platform.”
The idea of using private money to pay for the new ship takes the programme back to where it was in 2019, before the pandemic, when the Cabinet Office was seeking private backers.
Under Mr Maiden’s plan, these business leaders could each put in around £50million to build the flagship, which would then cost about £20 million a year of public money to run.
His own design – submitted to the Ministry of Defence earlier this year – has so far cost him £420,000 “paid out of my children’s inheritance”.
Mr Maiden said that the wave of patriotism and goodwill since the late Queen’s funeral meant that people would be open to a replacement for Britannia, possibly called “Elizabeth the Second” or “Great Britain”, after Brunel’s ship.
Mr Maiden, 89, first set up a company to build a new “national flagship” in 1998, a year after the yacht was decommissioned by the Labour government.
Mr Johnson then adopted the term “national flagship” rather than a “yacht”, when he revived the plans in May last year, saying it would reflect “the UK’s burgeoning status as a great, independent maritime trading nation”.