New blow for Titanic shipyard as Royal Navy works head to Spain: 500 jobs at risk at Harland & Wolff

Labor will abandon plans to build support ships for the Royal Navy in Northern Ireland, with the loss of 500 jobs, and transfer the work to Cadiz, Spain, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Belfast-based Harland & Wolff, which built the Titanic, was contracted last year along with Navantia, a Spanish state shipbuilding giant, to build three Navy ships in a £1.6bn deal.

Anger that some of the work was going to Spain was mitigated by the promise that much of it would go to Northern Ireland.

Under the original plans, H&W and Navantia would have each built several sections of the ships, known as blocks, at their respective shipyards.

These blocks would then have been taken to Belfast for final assembly, with the first vessels entering service in 2031 and the last in 2033.

But Harland’s decision to call in administrators on Friday has plunged the project into crisis and could result in all work being moved to Cadiz.

The plans are being drawn up by Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds and Defense Secretary John Healey.

H&W has appointed restructuring specialist Teneo to find buyers for the shipyard and other operations.

It is hoped that a deep-pocketed UK company such as Babcock International, which runs the Devonport naval yards in Plymouth and Rosyth in Scotland, can still save H&W and the project.

But Whitehall has made clear it will not support H&W. Earlier this year, the company revealed that its financial plans were based on the assumption that it would receive a state guarantee for a £200m loan to tide it over until money started arriving from the ships. support and other contracts.

After lengthy negotiations, the company finally admitted in July that the government had rejected it.

That triggered the departure of boss John Wood and the appointment of interim managers, including restructuring expert Russell Downs. Support ships are urgently needed for the Royal Navy to make the most of its new aircraft carriers, HMS Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales.

The only support ship still afloat, the RFA Fort Victoria, built by H&W in 1990, is undergoing a lengthy refit. A senior Downing Street source said this was yet another problem Labor had inherited from the Conservatives. He said: “There are a number of options including UK companies buying the company, but they will want to renegotiate the work, which will cost the UK taxpayer and likely delay production and delivery of the ships.”

“The preferred option is Navantia, which has the contract to manufacture, assemble and deliver the ships on time and on budget.”