§ Mr. Trotterasked the Secretary of State for Defence what conclusions he has drawn as to the future management and control of the Royal dockyards in the light of the study into their organisation conducted in 1980 under the chairmanship of the then Under-Secretary of State for Defence for the Royal Navy.
§ Mr. BlakerThe main thrust of the report that dockyard management should be given greater freedom to manage in an environment closer to that of the commercial word is accepted. Firm conclusions must await the outcome of further work flowing from the decisions announced in Cmnd. 8288.
§ Mr. Trotterasked the Secretary of State for Defence how the total ship refitting load is divided in percentage terms between the five naval dockyards.
§ Mr. BlakerEstimates for the current financial year—1981–82—make the following provision for ship repair and alteration excluding work done in other ship repair yards:
percentage £ millions Royal Dockyards Devonport 35 135 Portsmouth 20 78 Chatham 21 79 Rosyth 20 78 Gibraltar 4 13 100 383
§ Mr Trotterasked the Secretary of State for Defence what is the present dockyard overload expressed as a percentage of capacity.
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§ Mr. BlakerEstimates for the current financial year —1981–82—provide for ship repair and alteration at a total cost of £439 million. Of this, £383 million—87 per cent.—is for work by the royal dockyards, and £56 million—13 per cent. —for work by other ship repair yards under contract: the latter figure may be taken to represent the amount of the total workload which is in excess of the capacity of the royal dockyards.