Delivery of the Royal Navy’s next-generation attack submarine fleet is conditional on productivity improvements at the Barrow shipyard, Minister for Defence Readiness and Industry Luke Pollard has told the House of Commons, as the government declined to put an exact figure on how many boats will be built.
Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge pressed the minister at defence questions, noting that the headline promise of the Strategic Defence Review on its publication in June 2025 was a commitment to buy up to 12 attack submarines, that the government could not say at the time how many that meant in practice, and that ministers had promised the detail of the review’s commitments would be set out in the Defence Investment Plan. “So exactly how many attack submarines are they going to buy?” he asked.
“The defence investment plan clearly sets out our intention to buy up to 12 SSN-AUKUS submarines,” Pollard replied. “Their delivery is conditional on the improvements in productivity that we are working with BAE Systems to deliver at Barrow, not just in workforce but in production shipyard facilities. We plan to buy up to 12 SSN-AUKUS submarines.”
The answer maintains the “up to 12” formulation that has stood since the Strategic Defence Review, while attaching the delivery of the fleet explicitly to output at Barrow-in-Furness, where BAE Systems builds the Royal Navy’s submarines. The Defence Investment Plan confirmed that steel will be cut on the first SSN-AUKUS boat next year, with the class replacing the Astute-class attack submarines and shared with Australia under the AUKUS partnership, and the government is targeting a production drumbeat of a new submarine every 18 months from the expanded Barrow and Raynesway facilities, a rate analysis has described as demanding without further capacity growth.
The conditionality Pollard described is matched by heavy investment in the capacity it depends on. The plan includes a Submarine Build Modernisation effort to expand manufacturing capacity, accelerate production and improve productivity in support of AUKUS, alongside £6 billion for expanding and transforming submarine manufacturing between 2025-26 and 2029-30, while Rolls-Royce has broken ground on a doubling of its Raynesway reactor site, where defence minister Lord Coaker revealed last week that the fifth SSN-AUKUS reactor is already in manufacture.
Barrow is simultaneously completing the final Astute-class boat and building all four Dreadnought ballistic missile submarines, and overall deterrent spending in the plan runs to £63 billion over the next four years across Dreadnought, SSN-AUKUS and the warhead programme.
Six
I suspected the number was dependent on building time line rather than budget not that budget won’t be an issue it’s just an issue twenty yers from now. But obviously you can’t buy it if they can’t build it.
Lining up his excuses for not ordering 12. Tosser.
Previous government said exactly the same.
Getting the excuses in early…..
How the hell are BAE and RR supposed to commit to the investment necessary to improve productivity if they don’t have a firm commitment on the number of boats being ordered?
I don’t know why people are being negative again.
It’s been explained many times that there’s a build window between dreadnaught and the next SSBN, and it’s all about how many SSNs can be built in that time. For Astute it was 7, but if they can build one every 18 months then it’s 12.
The MPs answer is accurate. I wish UKDJ did a better job explaining it, I’m sure they’re aware of the reason.
At it already cutting the numbers, no shock there, say we should get 12 then back tract to save money. Alweays the same with the UK Mod, lies. tricks, smoke and mirrors but never stick to thier word, lets she how many we end up with, snd were the excuses come from. Stamer shafted the military and he knows it,
Ladies and gentlemen place your bets, the games have just begun