§ Mr. Needhamasked the Secretary of State for Energy whether he will make a statement on the award of a contract for building a multi-function service vessel required by Shell/Esso for work in the British sector of the North Sea.
§ Mr. GrayShell/Esso are today announcing their decision to have the vessel built by Rauma Repola of Finland, who submitted the most competitive tender.
The Government recognise that this order would have brought valuable work to United Kingdom yards and considered most carefully with Shell/Esso the possibility of a United Kingdom build. But on the facts presented it was considered that the degree of subsidy required could not be justified. The vessel will, however, be built to an advanced design by Seaforth Maritime, a wholly British-owned offshore engineering and service company based in Aberdeen which has also secured a five year £100 million operating contract 496W for the vessel. There are also good prospects that orders worth about £16 million for installed equipment will be placed in the United Kingdom.
Whilst the loss of the shipbuilding order will be a disappointment to United Kingdom yards and to Scott Lithgow in particular, there will no doubt be further opportunities for United Kingdom yards to tender for specialised offshore vessels and structures of this general type, and I wish to emphasise that the Government decision not to intervene in the present case is completely without prejudice to the attitude which the Government may adopt in any future cases, each of which will be considered on its merits.