We at Pallion take the view that a strong UK shipbuilding sector requires a strong UK. One in which the UK yards can work together when required. This being in working with all UK facilities in England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. That said, if a break up of the UK be it with Scotland, it is clear that while commercial projects will benefit British yards in England and Scotland working together. This will be lost in any break up of the Country for taxpayer funded ships. A state leaving the Country will have no right in building ships funded by a separate Country (taxpayers money) and vice versa. Pallion has the ability to build what will be very complex ships and very likely bigger ships than the Type 45 they will replace. With a building dock undercover of nearly 600', the Pallion facility is not too dissimilar to the proposed Scotstoun facility envisaged by BAE which would be the ideal facility for these new warships. At a stroke, Rosyth Babcock, BAE Scotstoun with BAE rented Govan and Ferguson Marine will be lost, along with the Inchgren facility, let alone the labour and skills. Pallion can be considered a facility of strategic and national security importance. The fair outcome of breakup would be for yards in Scotland still carrying out Royal Navy contracts, but also involve a few facilities from the remainder of the UK to be used in building these ships. This would include Pallion. It is a sovereign requirement to build all warships within this Country.
As well as Pallion's unique features and advantages for the UK maritime sector, Pallion offers the important security of a all under covered ship factory able to modernise that will secure the future Royal Navy needs with a skill base that is local with opportunity to create to design and build ships efficiently. These ships along with many other UK projects provide many years of work which Pallion will be involved in with or without breakup. Pallion is a national asset which will provide continuous production and high turn over and will benefit the local economy in wealth creation and a re-balancaed economy where there are many projects to undertake that are worth many tens and hundreds of millions of pounds. This facility is shovel ready.
