Will the Royal Navy put its own auxiliaries out of business?
December 9th, 2009 | Aviation Carriers Military Sealift Command Morale Royal Navy | Posted by Phil Ewing
Has the Royal Navy's carrier Ark Royal lat-moved from being a ship of the line to a resupply auxiliary? // Royal Navy
This could be nothing, or it could be huge — the Royal Navy used one of its aircraft carriers, the Ark Royal, to refuel and re-supply a frigate at sea last month. It could be just another training evolution, or it could be the first step to privatizing the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, Britain’s equivalent of the Military Sealift Command, which operates supply ships, oilers and other support ships for the Royal Navy.
What it means seems to depend on where you’re coming from, according to this story in The News of Portsmouth, England. Royal Navy officials say not to worry, but the maritime unions who depend on the RFA consider it “ominous” that Ark Royal, and not an RFA supply ship, showed it could rendezvous at sea with the frigate St. Albans ahead of more expected budget cuts:
As revealed by The News last month, shocked RFA staff were told in Portsmouth that the Treasury had pushed for cost savings that could mean the privatisation of the service.
A fleet auxiliary worker from Portsmouth, who does not want to be named, said: ‘To have the navy showing how it can replenish ships without the RFA ahead of a major review is really insensitive. We are waiting to hear if we will be out of work and that seems like really bad timing.’
[Union] spokesman Geoff Martin said: ‘The display of a warship-to-warship replenishment is very ominous as the service faces this uncertainty.’
Times are hard everywhere. Well, with no remaining air wings of Sea Harriers, the Royal Navy at least has found a new use for its carriers…
Comments
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gf0012-aust Says:
December 10th, 2009 at 6:41 amgawd I hope this doesn’t take off. Some of the Senior Sirs in the RAN and certainly in the Govt have a soft spot for anything that comes out of the UK, and esp RN processes.
I can see the PPP finance geeks getting bright eyed about the potential for this to cut even more money out of our budgets.
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Greg "Gunner" Stitz Says:
December 10th, 2009 at 9:15 pmUmmm…Hasn’t the USN been using IT’S carriers as supply ships for YEARS?? What is MSC, other than the contracting arm for the USN? Look at how many USNS ships are COCO (Contractor Owned, Contractor Operated) and GOCO (Government Owned, Contractor Operated) vs how many are GOGO (Government Owned, Government Operated). Outsourcing is NOT AUTOMATICALLY a bad thing (not automatically a good thing either…)