The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the Fleet Solid Support (FSS) ship programme remains on track, with production of the first ship expected to begin later in 2025 following the successful takeover of Harland & Wolff by Navantia UK (NUK), according to a written response published on 30 April 2025.
Responding to a question from James Cartlidge MP (Conservative – South Suffolk), Defence Minister Maria Eagle stated: “Successful delivery of the Fleet Solid Support (FSS) ship programme, which is currently in the design phase, remains a priority.” She added that the acquisition of Harland & Wolff by NUK in January 2025 “has provided greater certainty to the delivery of the FSS programme and protects UK’s shipbuilding capability.”
The takeover followed Harland & Wolff entering administration and has led to renewed momentum in modernising the historic Belfast shipyard. “Works to recapitalise the Belfast shipyard have restarted since NUK’s takeover… This investment will further strengthen UK capability, modernising the shipbuilding facilities in Belfast and leading to increased productivity and capacity,” Eagle confirmed.
The design phase of the programme is said to be progressing well, and the MoD anticipates the start of physical production on the first of three ships in 2025. These vessels will be delivered to the Royal Fleet Auxiliary to provide critical at-sea replenishment capabilities to the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group and wider fleet.
Eagle noted that following the change in ownership of Harland & Wolff, “the Government has worked closely with NUK on the future of the FSS programme and agreed with them the minimum changes to the contract necessary, on commercial terms, to ensure the programme’s continued delivery with the least possible delay.” She also confirmed that “extensive work is being undertaken to understand the full impact on the programme.”
The modernisation of Belfast’s facilities—alongside the preservation of jobs across NUK’s four shipyards—is expected to improve long-term productivity and sustain sovereign industrial capabilities.
Still designing the ship and no steel cut, being built at a yard that hasn’t built a ship for twenty years. I can’t see us getting these ships until well into the 2030’s.
Hello Jim, jut a little note to say keep up the great work. I can no longer make comments here since receiving veiled threats from “sailorboy” and another stalwart of this forum which once again have resulted in my comments being blocked and deleted. This is not the first time here, nor is it the only place i visit where sailorboy has seemingly been active in my removal.
During this past 3 weeks I have avoided commenting on certain others posts just to see what happens, It appears that certain members have the power to get people removed at will.
Anyway, keep up the good work.
oh and “I’ll be back”.
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How come you have just successfully commented then?
Not me look at my Avatar.
Which veiled threats HW? No posters have any power to get anyone removed. If posters use foul and abusive language to others then anyone can use the contact us tab at the top to report it. There used to be a red flag icon too, but that was lost when the site experienced its crash.
Are you aware that Sailor Boy is a teen who is either still in or has just left school? The junior of the site, why should he be picking fights?
Don’t worry, he’s very much aware of my age. He just doesn’t accept that a teenager can either be interested or allowed to comment on defence news, and would rather believe that somebody gets a kick out of pretending to be underage. It’s happened a couple of times before, but I now suspect they were all the same person.
The post that got him (or someone very like him) blocked from Navy Lookout (the “other place”) was:
“Who are you to tell me how to act on here? Did George p%ss you off? Are your school lessons getting too much? Does your fake persona cause you angst?
I’ll comment in any way I choose if that’s OK with you sonny?”
I imagine it was the last sentence that got him blocked. Also, bit surprised he mentioned George, must have been because I was trying to ask about the comments ‘updates’ under one of the articles recently.
I remember those accusations against you, and I agree, I’ve also suspected it’s a multi ID poster, who has changed profiles several times. Certain phraseolgy gives it away for me.
But, I may well be wrong, In which case, my apologies to Halfwit.
Daniele,
The above isn’t the Halfwit we have come to know, hence the #2 addition.
Just like ChariotRider’s name was pirated for one of those “easy money” bots a few days ago.
It sucks when people use your age as a younger person with an interest in defence as some sort of leverage, either to disregard your opinions or to belittle you.
I’ve not really experienced it, at least never in a malicious sense, but it’s a shame if you have.
Leh, how old are you?
I know you’ve mentioned being younger a couple of times on here, and I’ve never met someone my age on these forums before.
No pressure, just curious how people like me (if indeed you are) get into this sort of thing.
The trolling thing usually happens soon after I mention my age in the context of a discussion, I think people have the idea that Defence should be an “adult’s concern” and don’t like getting corrected by a child. For some reason the true experts never get offended by it.
I’m 11, I came here to pass the time of day as school is so boring, it’s great to be able to talk to someone of similar age here, well it’s better than doing lessons isn’t it. Don’t let the nasty grownups get to you Toby.
Well, I held you as Junior “Mascot” of the site, but you’ve ost your crown, SB.😆
Leh smashed it.
Read your posts before Leh and, while I had noted you were young, I assumed late teens.
You’re as welcome here as anyone. 👍
DM, that’s a different Leh.
Look at the “profile picture”. Mine are all the same brown and green pattern even though I post from two different devices, but ‘Leh’ must be using two different emails addresses.
Also the very different sentence structure.
11 would indeed be impressive considering Leah’s writing style and knowledge, but I doubt that the last comment is the same person.
It’s not me, Sailor. Thanks for the compliment though!
I’m in my late teens, but I won’t go any more specific for obvious reasons.
Well spotted SB! 🙄
This site is full of charlatans. What sad lives getting off posting under multiple IDs.
And they have been here for a long time, as they know your name, which you’ve not used for a long time.
I recall said poster telling you they’d checked your comment history and asking why you didn’t use your name.
“A long time”, DM! Don’t flatter me, I’ve been here for what, a fifth as long as you have?
Yes the name thing has been going on for a while, I recall the first was under the name Brom. I decided to stop using my real name for obvious reasons probably shared by Leh, the first of which is that it is searchable online (although very well hidden).
Leh, that’s absolutely fine. I probably toe the line a bit much when it comes to personal information, so a little more privacy is a good idea.
Pissing myself.
The real benefit of a Gravatar is that it makes your profile harder (not impossible) to fake.
Yes, not many have one here for some reason.
I never worked out how to add one pre-crash, and now I don’t think it’s possible.
Wish I could, I need somewhere to put all of those CSG pics!
True, but what had Rosyth built before QE?
It’s a start, I suppose, but everything still too little and takes too long. When you see that China has built the equivalent of the RN in the last four years it shows just how far down we’ve gone.
It’s actually more like every two years to be honest.
Rob, is it fair to compare us with a huge country with a centralised command economy like China, which has low wages, a need for a huge Navy and a modest H&S culture in Industry? More interesting to compare ourselves to other medium to large European countries such as France.
We developed an insane culture of very expensive manufacturing.
A lot of that is approach and expected inefficiency.
Yeah, but the unlying cause again is that the cost of living is very high in the UK (blame factors such as the high cost of housing ..etc)
China, Iran, India can manufacture large complex machinery much cheaper than most Western countries. The only way to compete would be if it was possible to 3D print large components/materials, and automate as much fabrication / assembly as you can., effectively taking much of the employment costs out of the equation.
It really isn’t down to wages.
It is down to:/
Over use of consultants
Over design in both senses
Crazy H&S regime
Crazy energy prices
Crazy land prices
Crazy finance costs
Next you need to understand that inefficiency multiples and does add.
The top three have to be addressed to make the UK competitive
The last one needs to be addressed – how to get SMEs cost effective finance. The clearing banks make their money ripping off SMEs.
Instant Upright, actually near re-shored manufacturing and distribution from China to Latvia because Latvia offered better value for money – I’m not sure that ‘China is cheap’ moniker applies like it used to in days past.
China has created a modern navy, whether it is able to fight as a modern navy is a different issue. Also, can China sustain the debt that it has created and when more and more Chinese are taking foreign holidays, can they sustain the outflow of foreign currency?
China may be heading for an economic fall which will create severed instability in her population and perhaps a new revolution.
The slowness of procurement is frustrating, but the upshot is something is being done to tackle the cause, namely atrophied manufacturing capacity.
Hoping Navantia will bring the H&W yard up to date.
Still in design so I hope they see sense and place two RAS rigs each side as the present trend since the Waves of having one on side and two the other is operationally limiting and naive! These ships are desperately needed so they need building at pace. Best of Luck with that and finally KISS principle please without all the computers that require OEM attendance every 5 minutes!!
They’d have to make the ship longer for that
Isn’t the point to be able to RAS simultaneously using two masts for the carrier and one for an escort?
None of the escorts can use two masts at once, so very few cases in which you would use all four rigs.
No he means double replenishment on the carriers. Which was in the plan but was dropped
So they can’t do a double RAS?
Why on earth have the two masts, then?
The forward one is for loading shells onto the front of ships
A bit like the heavy duty RAS rigs that were also dropped…..
Whist there is a fast break away procedure – RAS is a high risk period of time as you present a very large and non manoeuvring slow attack surface.
So minimising RAS time is usually a key design driver.
Unfortunately penny pinching central took over on this one and the RAS capacity was dropped and then the ability to double RAS also fell away.
Is that rendering of FSS an official take on how they will look?
Reminds me of the Tides, the Points, and the previously planned LSS.
I believe it was an early concept proposal? Hard to keep tragbof all the CGIs now.
It’s got the windows it’s recent
I thought it had Linux
I think it’s jolly good that we’te pressing on with this and setting a challenging ISD
That’s how our procurent should work. When the concept is approved, it should be Thunderbirds go, not dickering around with enfless studies and reviews.
Of course it is not possible with much of the emerging tech kit, where a lot more study and trial may be needed. But for most of our standard kit, we need to be much quicker getting from staff target to ISD.
I think that the Phalanx CIWS are becoming obsolete now, and that the Royal Navy should instead invest in the 35mm Millennium guns as they are a far better CIWS due to their AHEAD ammunition for not only the RFA ships but the entire surface fleet. Seeing that Argentina is re-arming itself, as last year it purchased F-16s from Denmark, perhaps we should learn from the lessons of the Falkland’s with MV Atlantic Conveyor which got sunk by two Exocets, and maybe even install a 3-cell ExLS on each ship with up to 12 quadpacked sea ceptors and give it a cheap off-the-shelf radar (Thales NS100?) for self defence. As usual with the Ministry of Defence, I expect they will be “fitted for but not with” their CIWS. An easy target for China to hit, which could potentially disable our entire CSG.
RFA aren’t a fan of missile systems in their ships
We need better CIWS, but I think the RN needs to standardise on the 40mm Bofors Mk4. It’s produced by BAE, already coming in service on the T31s and can fire airburst ammunition.
Agree on the 40mm, infact why not go for the 57mm it’s not deck penetrating and takes engagement ranges out to 8Km.
That’s exactly why the 40mm is better to replace Phalanx.
BAE say it could be palletised and so operated in a similar drop in, lift out way to Phalanx as long as the mount has sensors.
The 57mm even in above deck configuration is a big bulky boi, so the removal for maintenance would be much harder. I also don’t trust it for CIWS until guided rounds get developed.
Total agreement, 20mm Phalanx CIWS is obsolete against modern missiles. If the missile is jerking Up / Down, or Left / Right, then Phalax will miss. 40mm Mk4 or 57mm, both with intelligent target seeking ammo, is a must. The Type 31s will be well protected with 57mm, 2x 40mm & Sea Ceptre as well.
I obviously don’t know the true ages of the commenters who have been talking about why the procurement of major items of military equipment is so slow and costly but I think that whatever age they are they seem to have a grasp of the problem with it as it stands, but I being an older person can remember back to a time when the military did not have a problem with procurement, we had all the major equipment we required and the personnel to operate and maintain it all, I could go on to write a book about my experience and understanding of what has gone wrong with the whole military procurement process, and it includes personnel recruitment and retention, but the simple answer is that successive governments have, since the end of WWII have seen the military as an easy target for saving money, and while it was the right thing to do at the time it didn’t stop, even now the government are still trying to get more and more out of a military that has less and less to do what the government demands. Until the government decides to actually invest in the military then nothing will change, to keep our military industry alive and able to produce the equipment needed we actually need a military to operate it, and with military personnel making the decisions of what we buy, not politicians or civil servants who know nothing about military needs. We are rapidly approaching VE Day and the military we have now is smaller than the entire military that were evacuated from Dunkirk, and that excludes those who were captured and those who never came home, and if the government truly wants to celebrate the men and women who made VE Day possible then give us the military we need to be able to avoid another Dunkirk and the years of misery that WWII caused, if the government wants a real deterrent to keep the peace then have a military that other nations are afraid to take on in war, nuclear weapons are a last ditch retaliation weapon, BOOTS ON THE GROUND are a real deterrent.