The Government’s pledge to build 12 nuclear-powered hunter-killer submarines has been welcomed as a vital move to meet modern threats – but defence insiders warn that a shortage of skilled workers and limited industrial capacity may make the plans undeliverable. According to the Strategic Defence Review, the UK aims to build one new boat every 18 months.
But with submarine construction limited to Barrow-in-Furness, production will only begin once the current batch of Dreadnought submarines – replacing the ageing Vanguard nuclear deterrent carriers – is completed. That work will take more than a decade. In the meantime, the Royal Navy’s recruitment shortfall will have to be addressed. Of the three branches, the Senior Service suffered the worst recruitment performance last year, hitting just 60% of its 4,040 target, with only 2,450 new sailors signing up.
Resulting record-long ocean patrols are not helping to retain those already crewing the submarine fleet. With serious questions over workforce availability and industrial readiness, the delivery target is already being labelled overambitious.
“There’s no way at the moment that the UK could manage to create one submarine every 18 months,” said Ryan Ramsey, a former submarine captain. The build infrastructure, the people required to build these submarines – they just don’t exist.”
Commander Tom Sharpe, a former naval officer, was more positive – but no less cautious. “What this has done is confirm what was always hoped – that Aukus could lead to 12 of these boats. That’s good news,” he said. “In fact, it’s probably the single line in the SDR that reflects the strategic imperative of where we are today. But what we’re talking about here in terms of effort from Barrow is, as I understand it, kind of off the charts.”
He said he believed a second build line would be needed to achieve the proposed delivery rate, but warned that the greatest bottleneck may be human rather than industrial.
“There are only a handful of people in the country who can do the required level of nuclear welding,” he said.
“Eventually, you run out of experts. You can’t just conjure them into being – no matter how rich or important the project.”
Insiders at BAe were more optimistic. Design on the new SSN-AUKUS boat actually began in 2017 and is only a couple of years from completion, claimed one source.
The defence giant had anticipated an order of 12 and has created the space to produce them.
“We’re pretty much at the back end of the R&D and conceptual design phase, and should have a final design agreed in the next couple of years,” they said. While they acknowledged a shortage of skilled workers – including nuclear welders – that is being addressed. “And while it’s possible that we could lose people to Australia, we are getting a lot of interest along the way – from Australians keen to come and work here.”
How the boats will be funded won’t be revealed until September, however. And while the first two will be built in the UK, it is not yet clear when Australia will receive its batch – or how long that might delay delivery of the promised 12 for the Royal Navy.
The timeline is concerning. “These are not new undertakings – they were first announced under David Cameron in 2016 and reaffirmed by Boris Johnson in 2020. And nothing was done,” said Vice Admiral Sir Jeremy Blackham, a former Deputy Commander-in-Chief Fleet. “Now that the announcement has been made, they can’t actually happen until the late 2030s. And meanwhile the threat is tomorrow.”
He added: “What is vitally important now if there is to be any deterrent effect is a visibly enhanced budget, real and genuine investment and, of course orders, not yet more words.”
