The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that HMS Northumberland, a Type 23 frigate, will be retired by March 2025 following the discovery of structural damage during its refit.
Defence Secretary John Healey outlined the decision in a Written Ministerial Statement, emphasising that it reflects the need for the UKās armed forces to transition to more modern capabilities.
āI have halted the current refit of HMS Northumberland, a Type 23 frigate, which will now be retired from the Fleet in March 2025,ā Healey stated. āAs a result of service well beyond the original Type 23 out-of-service date, the structural damage discovered during refit makes her uneconomical to repair.ā
Transition to Type 26 Frigates
HMS Northumberlandās retirement marks a step towards replacing the aging Type 23 fleet with the advanced Type 26 frigates, designed for anti-submarine warfare.
Healey confirmed that āthe Type 23 frigates will be replaced by the most advanced Anti-Submarine Warfare frigates in the world: the Type 26, the first of which, HMS Glasgow, will be delivered by 2027.ā
The decision is part of broader efforts to modernise defence capabilities and address financial pressures within the defence budget.
Financial and Operational Implications
Healey highlighted that āthese decisions will deliver better value for money and ensure we are in a better position to modernise and strengthen UK defence.ā The retirement of several ageing platforms, including HMS Northumberland, is expected to save up to Ā£500 million over the next five years.
The shipās company, previously assigned to the refit period, has already been reassigned, and there will be no immediate impact on Royal Navy operations.
Broader Context
This announcement follows Healeyās commitment to addressing the fiscal and strategic challenges facing UK defence. Citing āwar in Europe, growing Russian aggression, and conflict in the Middle Eastā as key threats, Healey stressed the need for resilience and readiness in the armed forces.
The retirement of HMS Northumberland is part of a wider effort to address what Healey described as āserious financial pressures in the Defence budgetā while ensuring the UK remains secure and prepared for emerging threats.
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UK is also set to lose a staggering 46 Watchkeeper Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)..
They’re complete garbage anyway. Too heavy, too slow, can’t operate in rain, crash often. Massively outdated. Good riddance, now let’s get some proper drones.
That’s fine James, the issue for me is what does the replacement capability iook like?
It’s a secret š
Agree …. and in serious numbers.
Correct..Procurement need a kick up the arse.
Are you aware they were recently upgraded with GTMI, and were queuing targets for Apache?
Protector no doubt is also heavy and slow.
I think there is room for all types, not just throw away ones.
I’m all for getting better but as usual it is the gap left as cuts are immediate and the replacement is where? When? How?
We have the RA with virtually no 155mm guns as they were all either cut or given away.
We have a RAC who’s Armoured Cavalry are using Warrior or who’s internal ORBAT has been rejigged as all the CVRT went before Ajax is ready.
We have got rid of most of the MCMV before the high tech autonomous stuff is in service.
I could go on but I cannot be bothered.
This is a sickness HMG/MoD have and it is getting tiresome.
Something is better than nothing.
betrayal labour ‘we are the party on defence’ liars and no different to the Tories before the. starmers government is as useful as a handbrake on a canoe and the SDSR, when it is published. Will finish the navy altogether.
And put the RAF in the same basket! What a bunch of morons!
Let’s hope that the savings made will be directed the right way like making sure HMS Kent’s refit is followed through as I’m sure she will need more than the Ā£35m allocated to her upgrade? With a little left for future Lloyd’s rectification of the T23’s in the coming years? And not just lots in some pointless review.
Lost not lots
Shouldn’t the structure worthiness assessment of the ship, been concluded sooner?
Northumberland had started refit in March, so conclusions should of been available by mid summer? And taken out of service soon after.
Once again MOD cost cutting coming back to bite us.
While the type 23 has mostly been a good design, their hull life was designed for just 18 years service. The builds used thinner steel to reduce weight and cost.
Is a replacement coming off the production line?
In 4 years
yep- like watching the grass grow – what a cluster f! Just a list of cuts with nothing positive, so much for SDR 25. I find the entire thing depressing.
Why let the truth get in the way of a great tale. Face facts. There were 14 years of cuts before now. Are you saying that nothing that happened was a result of murderous austerity where the rich increased their wealth by orders of magnitude?
I tar the past Government with the same brush. Their lethargy set the scene for Labour. Nonetheless, they are now in charge. The chooks have now come home to roast. SDR 25 will not be pretty.
Two are in the water and a third will be soon.
Still 4 years from commission
not in our lifetimes I’d guess, one of the carriers will be mothballed. id stake my nuts on it, and maybe the last T26.
no need to risk you tackle – absolutely one will be mothballed!
not in our lifetimes I’d gueds
not in our lifetimes I’d guess
You get what you vote for
Absolutely. I find it hard to believe why anyone would have though it would have been any different?
Yes, 12+ years of kicking the can down the road and professional grade bumbling by the public-school dunces clown-party has left the country, and it’s defence in a shambles. Better to cut out obsolete and underperforming assets from an already over stretched budget now. The focus must shift onto eeking out every ounce of performance from existing high-end platforms, as well developing high quality, advanced new systems. It’s imperative that new systems come with a baked in ability to be swiftly adapted to counter developing threat profiles and mission delivery requirements, not just the ones everyone is burbling on about now.
Building a replacement frigate by March 2025 will be a challenge.
Itās literally impossible
With all these ships being removed from service there must be a ever growing pool of guns, radars, missiles, decoys, ammunition for re-use on other or even new ships in construction?
30mm and 20mm maybe but not the 4.5 mk 8s gun and gunbay mod have gone for the fully automated 5 inch Decoys as well MOD looking at trainable launchers rather than static .But with the cuts happening at least the Victorys refit is still going ahead but with French oak .
30mm and 20mm maybe but not the 4.5 mk 8s gun and gunbay mod have gone for the fully automated 5 inch Decoys as well MOD looking at trainable launchers rather than static .But with the cuts happening at least the Victorys refit is still going ahead but with French oak . Oh the irony.
Apart from Seaceptor, most of the weapons and sensors being removed from Type 23s will be replaced by more up to date technology on the new ships.
There’s the 4 Phalanx’s free from Bulwark and Albion .
Disappointing, but not unexpected. Everyone and everything things has a shelf life, but really, really needs to be reorganised without involving the Clowns š¤” bus. Anyone for a mothball. šš³ļøBtth.
Serious pressures on the budget, how about scrapping the thousands of diversity manager and consultant jobs, the tens of thousands of unwanted and unneeded civil servants, all the trillions spent on report like the one in Wales that conclude we need to ban dogs from parks to get more bame people using the parks and kick the illegals back to france or better still africa instead of giving them 5 star hotels …. Then we can make the defence budget 10 or 15 percent of gdp where it needs to be for at least 10 years to fix the neglect of the last 40
I quite agree š with you this government the so called party for the people are no better than the previous one it’s been going down hill since. You only have to look back when that snake š Cameron came to power and scrapped our aircraft carriers and the outstanding harriers plus other ships š¢ and slashing the army, navy and airforce to shreds just to bail out the robbing banks š¦
So a further defence budget cut when there are 3 wars on our planet and one scarce spitting distance. The scrapping of our assault ships and more planes and people and it’s a damned good job the aircraft carriers are out and about or the damned treasury would have scrapped them as well. Did we not learn diddly squat from ww2 and the Falklands, being weak and unprepared brings war, not can, not might but does bring wat. We are inviting war and a nuclear deterrent that has failed to work the last twice it has been tried is no deterrent. Worse is that we are well beyond not being able to defend even the isle of white. Disgusting is what it is, but we can give trillions to other countries for mythical climate change and spend billions on illegal migrants and diversity
It’s NOT a Defence budget cut! Have you actually read the Ministerial statement? The budget increased the defence budget by Ā£2.9 billion and this latest announcement is about using money NOT cutting money!
Clearing the decks for the new frigates and maybe additional Merlins in the SDR.
lol, no. These cuts wonāt buy us anything
They free up Ā£500 million so yes they will!
Ā£500m could buy 3x Kongsberg Vanguard which, given our exposure on undersea infrastructure would be useful.
Radakin today sounds like West 20 odd years ago.
If he had a spine he would quit.
We build two aircraft carriers, we could have got 20 Corvette for the price. Russian Corvetes only weigh 100tn more than our River Class ships with 40 more crew. Our ships have a pop gun the Russian Corvetes carry a very comprehensive armanents package.
Theyāre corvettes, they donāt go very far
Corvettes cant do half the stuff we need.
The QE carriers can host Merlin anti submarine helicopters, which can hunt ruZZian subs more effectively as a group. An sub hunting exercise was carried out earlier this year in the North Atlantic with a carrier.
Exactly, in the event of a serious war how long would the aircraft carriers last, 10 minutes? They are constantly being shadowed
They would last far longer and have much more effective use than Russian Corvettes!
How much has been wasted so fat on this refit.
Doesnāt matter to the government they donāt care
A reputable source quoted next years foreign aid budget this week. In the context of what the government is spending and where. Ā£8.5Bn apparently. That’s billion with a b. I has assumed that it was a billion or two and I found that galling enough. The same source said that one in three children in the UK is now brought up in poverty. Just what sort of educational attainment will the one in three achieve and how badly will this effect our future competitiveness.
I believe that much of the foreign aid ends up in the Swiss bank accounts of politicians and warlords. I would cut everything that cannot be audited beyond reasonable doubt and split the rest between lifting the next generation out of poverty and keeping them safe through defence. Let the UN step in if we cut too much.
Apparently we’re still sending aid to India and China. In part to fund their space programmes! Either way, we ought to be keeping back at least Ā£6Bn for our own urgent needs.
Shouldn’t the structure worthiness assessment of the ship, been concluded sooner?
Northumberland had started refit in March, so conclusions should of been available by mid summer? And taken out of service soon after.