Examination of Witnesses (Questions 100-119)
MR BERNIE
HAMILTON, MR
KEITH HAZLEWOOD,
MR BOB
KING AND
MR TERRY
WAITING
21 NOVEMBER 2006
Q100 Chairman: Thank you. And
Mr King?
Mr King: Good morning. My name
is Bob King. For the purposes of this meeting I am the lead negotiator
for Prospect, the trade union. We have around about 1,500 members,
mainly professional and scientific grades in AWE at Aldermaston
and in Burfield so, unlike my colleagues, my main lead role is
in relation to those two areas, although Prospect as a union does
have scientific and professional members at the submarine bases
as well.
Q101 Chairman: Can you break down
those figures and say how many work at Aldermaston?
Mr King: Staff?
Q102 Chairman: The 1,500, your
members?
Mr King: We have 1,500 members
at Aldermaston and Burfield, the two sites in Berkshire out of
around 4,000 staff. There are other trade unions there as well.
Chairman: Can I begin by saying thank
you very much for your written memoranda which have been most
helpful. Let us move on to the first issue, the Government's White
Paper and David Crausby.
Q103 Mr Crausby: As you know,
the Government have promised to publish a White Paper on the future
of the UK's future nuclear deterrent by the end of the calendar
year, something I think we all look forward to. What do each of
you hope that its conclusions will be?
Mr Waiting: As far as KOFAC is
concerned, in Barrow-in-Furness we are pleased that the White
Paper is, hopefully, going to come before the end of this session
of Parliament. We would welcome this. We recognise the arguments
that are going backward and forwards about where the deterrent
should be based, if we are to have a nuclear deterrent. I think
the argument has been won that it should be a submarine-based
deterrent, and that the numbers of people that it would employ
in Barrow-in-Furness, should it be a submarine-based deterrent,
would certainly sustain the workforce that we have at the moment
for some years to come. If we do not have this nuclear deterrent
based on a submarine platform, well, I am afraid the future for
Barrow-in-Furness is indeed bleak. I think at the session on 2
November, Mr Crausby, you mentioned that you came from a cotton
town where the industry had folded and people lost their jobs
but they moved on and they got other work. In Barrow-in-Furness,
as you are aware, we are 33 miles down a cul-de-sac. There is
nowhere to go. Before we can get any meaningful employment we
have to travel at least 100 miles to the south, and Preston and
beyond are the only places for us. We believe that we have the
skills in Barrow-in-Furness to build the submarine and to make
sure that it is delivered on time and on cost. The amount of work
that has been done on current orders on Astute on making the submarine
cheaper and more affordable to the MoD is tremendous. The work
that is on-going in the plans that the managing director and his
team have for the yard has taken the cost out of shipbuilding.
The delivery needs to be examined, I know that, and I am quite
confident that Mr Easton and his team can do that, but we really
do need that platform to be built in Barrow-in-Furness. There
is no other yard in the country that can do it. If you even think
about saying that we will defer the decision for two years, it
would be the end for Barrow in shipbuilding, I promise you that.
It is not just the 4,000 people around in the shipyard. It means
that in Barrow-in-Furness 70-odd thousand people will suffer.
We suffered tremendously in the early 1990s when we lost 9,000
jobs nearly overnight. We are still paying the price of that actually
with the skills gap in Barrow-in-Furness. We are overcoming that
now, we are getting our way out of that, but it is something that
we could not sustain again. Any delay in this order would have
a tremendous impact on Barrow-in-Furness and, as I say, it could
be the death knell for the whole town.
Q104 Chairman: We will come to
a lot of those issues in some of the questions we ask you.
Mr Hazlewood: From the trade union
point of view, we are actually looking at the continuity of employment
to cut out the peaks and troughs from the industry because it
has been devastating to the whole of the shipbuilding, aerospace
and the submarine-building industries. You get peaks and you get
troughs and in the troughs you lose your capability and in a lot
of cases these people never come back and when you are peaking
you are struggling for jobs. If we can get some continuity all
away across the piece that would be very helpful from the trade
union point of view. There needs to be a recognition of the skills
involved in the industries that we are representing here today.
Also we cannot emphasise enough the importance of the work for
the local community and this particular yard that we are on about,
Barrow-in-Furness, as my colleague Mr Waiting has emphasised,
is on a 33-mile cul-de-sac. There is no other employment for that
particular area. We also have problems with UK manufacturing at
this moment in time, as we are all aware, and we are hoping that
the White Paper will address that and lead to UK prosperity and
the upsurge in the economy which is a very much needed boost.
Q105 Mr Crausby: Thank you. Mr
Hamilton?
Mr Hamilton: From an Amicus point
of view we welcome the publication of the Government's White Paper.
We hope and we believe it will be consistent with the Defence
Industrial Strategy principles. We believe that this has to maintain
and retain the strategic capability to build these submarines
and to replace this deterrent. We believe that that consistency
in strategic approach will give the commitment the industry seeks
to put the investment in place to maintain those skills that are
required. We have heard from our colleagues about the devastating
effect of the gap between Vanguard and Astute which had caused
that effect and I think that the Defence Industrial Strategy sets
out a different way forward on that and gives us a long-term vision.
We hope the Government and Parliament comes to a decision soon
and, as you have heard, it is important that it does come to that
decision soon for the future of the industry and to retain that
strategic capability within this sovereignty, within these shores.
That will allow the investment to take place that is required
to maintain and to further progress the skills, education and
investment in retraining programmes within the different respective
sites, whether it be in the build, the front-line primes, whether
it be in the supply chain or whether it be in the support and
infrastructure that is required for that decision to be taken.
And we hope that the pre-Budget report and the Comprehensive Spending
Review do not impact in any way in terms of delaying a decision
or that Parliament decides to delay that decision because, as
we have heard recently from the industry captains themselves,
there is a specific need for a specific drumbeat of these orders
taking place to retain that capability and skills within the industry,
and I hope that the White Paper contains that view and that vision
and that Parliament then takes its decision.
Mr King: To echo the points colleagues
have made, but I think to emphasise another one—as far as
Prospect in relation to AWE is concerned, it is the speed of the
decision that is more important than anything else. I believe
it is highlighted in one of this Committee's reports about the
age profile of our staff and the members at AWE, and if is a decision
is not made relatively quickly there will not be the ability to
succession plan, eg to pass those skills on. We have got concerns
in relation to the newer people coming through and the training
that they are getting. It was only announced yesterday, I understand,
that Reading University, which is the closest university to Aldermaston,
has closed its physics department, which is a big concern. AWE
needs intake now to train those people up. It is not sufficient
to have the qualifications, it needs the experience to do the
work, so whatever the decision is, whether it is going to be new
build and upgrade or simply to maintain the current or even decommission,
there are different skills and different people that need to be
involved, so the quicker that decision the quicker we can do the
succession planning and get the new skills in.
Mr Waiting: I would just like
to clarify something. We are not talking about the missile systems.
We are talking about the platform and there has been a lot in
the press and I do know that people are talking about the actual
missiles are going to be replaced. All we are replacing is the
submarine. I know that it has been spoken of that you could perhaps
refurbish the current fleet of Vanguard class submarines and upgrade
them and prolong their life slightly, but I do not think that
is a viable solution in the long run and I think it is more costly.
I am sorry, I should have said that earlier.
Chairman: To the witnesses can I say
that you will perhaps agree with a lot of the points that your
colleagues make, in which case there is no need to repeat them—and
thank you very much for not doing so in that last answer session.
David Borrow?
Q106 Mr Borrow: If I can look
at the issue of replacing submarines. If we ignore completely
the jobs and the skills base and everything around that, what
in your view is the reason that the UK needs the capacity to design,
build and maintain the nuclear-powered submarines? Why can we
not simply buy them from somebody else that builds them without
having all these worries about drumbeats and capacity and skill
bases, and simply get out of the business and go and buy it somewhere
else?
Mr Waiting: For instance, if you
were going to buy them from America, I think the cost of the American
submarine is $2.5 billion, which far outweighs anything that you
are going to be buying from the UK. The French would be another
option, I understand and you could buy from France, but I do not
think that they have got the capability to be up to the sort of
standard that we require. The other thing is that if you want
a strategic defence do you really want it to be built in another
country? Are we going to lose all of the skills so that if ever
in the future you needed to build a submarine, you would not have
the capability, you would lose all the design skills and all the
tradesmen who are so highly skilled. Many of the members of this
Committee visited the yard in Barrow and saw the people there.
You saw the people in the shipyard. They are not ordinary people.
They were walking round in overalls and everything else but really
they have got extraordinary skills, and to waste those you have
got to be very careful in what you are doing and understand what
you are doing because you will never ever be able to assemble
that workforce again once it goes.
Mr Hazlewood: I agree with what
my colleague says. This is one of the biggest concerns that we
have regarding the United States. We believe that the Americans'
way of sharing work and its intellectual property is based on
protectionism. For example, the British model is of free trade
but the manufacturing strategy in America is that in defence and
the supply chain 70% of the work has got to be fabricated in America.
This applies to ships, planes and other defence equipment, therefore
enhancing the American manufacturing strategy and it would be
detrimental to the UK losing jobs and skills, as my colleague
has already said, without repeating what he is saying, as the
Chairman mentioned, I agree with my colleague's comments.
Mr Hamilton: I think it is vitally
important that we retain that sovereign capability and strategic
capability. I also think that you have to look at the cost of
taking the decision that says you buy off the shelf because the
infrastructure and not just the front-line jobs would be affected
by that and the communities would be affected by that. As my colleague
from Barrow said, it is a remote community and if you look at
cities across the UK where the sites are, whether it be the repair
or the base or the actual build sites these are in naturally remote
communities. That decision would be a devastating decision and
therefore the public expenditure to replace that against what
it would cost to maintain and continue with that sovereign capability
would have to be balanced. Therefore there are two arguments.
One is the public expenditure argument but the second is the sovereign
capability that has to be retained, in our view.
Q107 Mr Borrow: The next question
I have got is really for Mr King and it is a similar question
looking at the warheads. Given that we buy the missiles from the
US, why can we not buy the warheads as well? Why do we need to
have the capacity to produce warheads here? Why not simply buy
the whole shooting match from the US?
Mr King: Not that I am not saying
that it is easy to close down a submarine base, but you cannot
close a nuclear facility very quickly so everything—the
technology, the science and the experience—is already there.
To reinforce some of the comments about the submarine bases, to
buy that experience in (which to be fair, thankfully, is not widespread
across the world) it is going to take an awful long time and a
lot of expenditure to do it. The other thing to reiterate on that
point—and I believe the MoD said this in evidence as well—is
the critical thing on this is to maintain independence. The other
element, particularly in relation to the production of the warheads,
is the fact that whatever decision the Government makes there
will be a necessity to maintain that facility for some time to
go. Without wishing to be trivial about it, you cannot just go
and put them in the dustbin and they will go away. There is a
need to maintain a facility and, if you are going to maintain
a facility, it seems sensible to maintain it in this country to
do any of the possible three outcomes that the Government may
decide because it is going to have to be there anyway.
Q108 John Smith: Mr King, you
mentioned the future of Reading University earlier. Is there a
direct link between Aldermaston and Reading in terms of training
and recruitment?
Mr King: I would have to refer
to my colleagues to know if there is a direct link but it seems
fairly clear that that is the nearest physics department to Aldermaston
and Burfield which are the two sites in Berkshire, so it would
seem fairly clear that that would be one that we would want to
maintain to maintain the science. I am not actually from the specific
area myself.
Q109 John Smith: But you could
come back to us?
Mr King: Yes, certainly.
Q110 Chairman: Perhaps it was
a generic point that you were making that you were concerned about
the closure of physics departments at universities.
Mr King: I am told by a post-it
note that there is not actually a direct link but there is a lot
of recruitment that comes directly from Reading University into
AWE.
Q111 Mr Hancock: In the Defence
Industrial Strategy they have made it quite clear that there were
key capabilities in submarine design and construction and indeed
in the operation and refit and how you could retain an onshore
facility. What do you consider would be the real risk because
it cannot be just a reason to go on with a nuclear deterrent because
of the future of Barrow. That cannot be a reason, can it, in realistic
terms, but there is an issue, is there not, about the time gap
that you talked about between when you stop building the existing
run of submarines and when the new contracts will be? What specialist
skills would actually be lost? People talk about it but nobody
ever emphasises what they are.
Mr Waiting: For instance, when
we stopped building Vanguard and there was a gap between Astute
and there were the layoffs in the early 1990s, then we got Astute
and that started coming on track, first of all we did not have
the basic skills in the numbers required for the outfitting and
the welding and all those peculiar skills that are peculiar to
nuclear submarine construction because they are extra special
skills. Before we got there we did not have the design team. If
you have a gap now you will start to lose your design team for
the naval capability because submarine designers can design surface
ships but people who design surface ships cannot necessarily do
the concept design of nuclear submarines, or of ordinary submarines
for that matter. Even as we speak now the Australian yards have
got the scent that there could be gaps in Barrow-in-Furness and
in the shipbuilding industry in the UK as a whole, and they are
advertising in the local press now to take these special skills
of the design people who do the concept design. Then you have
got the drafting people who put that together and then you have
got the workforce who carry it out and work to those drawings.
They disappear very, very quickly and they are not, as I said
earlier, ordinary skills, they are extraordinary skills of that
workforce. It is dead easy to think that a welder is a welder.
I am telling you in Barrow-in-Furness a welder is not just a welder.
Welders for the reactor have got extra special skills and people
who design have got the extra special skills which, as I say,
once they are gone they are gone for good. They are not lost to
Barrow-in Furness because, as you quite rightly say, I suppose
you could replicate what we do in another yard (it would take
you a few years but you could do it) but you would not have those
skills because they would go forever, and if you are not training
people in those skills, as my colleague has said from Aldermaston,
you lose those skills forever and they are gone for good.
Q112 Mr Hancock: In that case
is there evidence that that training is on-going now?
Mr Waiting: Yes.
Q113 Mr Hancock: What are retention
rates like in a plant like Barrow?
Mr Waiting: Actually they are
very good because the design engineers, especially for what they
are do because what we build is unique to Barrow-in-Furness, cannot
get that sort of experience and work anywhere else. The designers
like doing that sort of work, that is what they do. They are not
necessarily all based in Barrow-in-Furness. BAE Systems have other
sites in the United Kingdom where some of these men and women
are based. Retention is very good because of the type of work.
There are obviously offers from other places that poach, for want
of a better term, our workers if they can, and they are offered
some quite extraordinary sums of money I understand to go and
do that. I also understand that some of them do like the challenges
that are put to them from the design and build of a nuclear submarine.
Q114 Mr Hancock: Do the others
feel much the same?
Mr Hazlewood: Just to be a bit
more specific Mr Hancock, yes, very much the same, but regarding
the specific skills you asked the question on, you look at the
skilled technicians or the draughtsman that are designing these
submarines, and also the skilled and semi-skilled trades such
as welders, platers, scaffolders, electricians and electronic
engineers, and while ever you have got work you will have a workforce
in such an area because there is nothing else, quite honestly,
for them in that area.
Q115 Mr Hancock: What about the
situation at Aldermaston and Burfield?
Mr King: In relation to training?
Q116 Mr Hancock: And holding on
to people.
Mr King: The retention is good
although there have been specialist skills lost at AWE, which
is one of the main concerns. The difficulty with it, and one of
the issues that our members always bring to our attention, is
the fact that they gain a qualification, a degree or whatever,
they then come to Aldermaston, they learn the nature of the business
they are involved in, and then you are pretty much limited to
where else you can go and work because of the fact that it is
so specialist. I have an example with me which is a job advert
which is for a fairly middle grade for a joining development scientist/engineer.
If you compare the qualifications and experience required for
that to an outside role in standard engineering, because of the
types of material that you are dealing with, the level of qualification
and experience, understandably, is considerably higher. The difficulty
that we have noticed from looking at the equivalent of our members
in scientific roles in the commercial sector is the average time
that they are staying with an employer is around three to four
years before they move on and try and develop somewhere else.
One of the key things we have got at AWE is the ability for a
scientist to have a long career progression without the need,
dare I say it, to succumb to swapping into a management role,
so the longevity is there and certainly from the scientific environment
people can come there and have a job for a long period of time,
which is how the job is developed.
Q117 Mr Hancock: If I could then
come to you first, when you said if we do not replace the deterrent
there will be an on-going need to maintain the existing capability
and to make sure it was safe, what sort of period of time would
you estimate? If there were no replacement for Trident, how quickly
would the situation at Aldermaston and Burfield go down? Would
it be a fairly gradual decline over the full length of the life
cycle of the existing boats or would it accelerate quite considerably?
Mr King: It is not so much the
life cycle of the supply; it is the life cycle of the material
that has got to be maintained, and it leads off the question I
believe was asked earlier about why can we not buy in. If we buy
in we do not know the life cycle. If we are supplied with a warhead
from the US, we do not know the properties of that. One of the
key roles that Aldermaston is maintaining is the stability of
the current warhead stockpile so it is going to be effectively
over the life cycle of the existing warheads obviously into decommissioning.
Q118 Mr Hancock: But you are employing
4,000 people there on the two sites. Are they all employed now
on just that task?
Mr King: No, there is maintenance.
Q119 Mr Hancock: Of the plant?
Mr King: There is maintenance
of the plant and there is maintenance of the materials and maintenance
obviously of the stability of the current stockpile, which is
the majority of the work that is done, and obviously decommissioning
work that comes back in from warheads that have come back from
use on the submarines. That is the majority of the work now and
obviously they are then refurbished and replaced and sent back
out. So it is basically keeping the current stockpile flowing,
which is why we were saying earlier there would be a change. If
it was the case that there was no longer a need for the deterrent,
then obviously the work would be solely on the decommissioning
and maintaining the stability of materials now. If it was to either
upgrade or continue with the current, then the work would remain
very much as it is now (although AWE is expanding just to keep
up with the work that it has got now). If it was a new build obviously
there is a new set of skills that we would need to look at and
probably those are the ones that are more worrying because the
place has been there some time and the skills to originally develop
this are getting older and older.
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