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Author Topic: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!  (Read 11690 times)

Mike S

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #25 on: October 19, 2010, 03:35:23 pm »

Think the headline in today's Times says it all really 'HMS Ignominious'. Instead of a proper strategic defence review it's the usual shortsighted cost cutting. If I've read the reports correctly we will be building 2 new carriers, one of which will be immediately mothballed, and the other won't have an air group to operate. You just couldn't make this stuff up . . . . .
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wbeedie

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #26 on: October 19, 2010, 03:41:14 pm »

    *   The Ark Royal, launched in 1985, will be decommissioned almost immediately, rather than in 2014, as previously planned
    * The construction of two new aircraft carriers, HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales, will go ahead, as it would cost more to cancel the projects than proceed with them
    * The navy will lose 4,000 personnel and its surface fleet will be cut from 24 to 19
    * Some squadrons of RAF Tornado jets will be saved - although some air force bases will close
    * The Army will have to cut up to 7,000 or so personnel over the next five years, and lose 100 tanks and heavy artillery
    * The Ministry of Defence itself will face substantial cuts to its civilian staff
    * The Nimrod MRA4 reconnaissance plane is to be cancelled, the BBC understands
A lot of jobs lost for a government that is desperate to cut the welfare bill and wont be felt worse than in Moray with two air bases on the verge of closure and the loss of employment for Forces and civilian contractors would be the equivelent on 70,000 in London ,not good for the local economy
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dreadnought72

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #27 on: October 19, 2010, 04:20:11 pm »

... the door will be open for foreign invasion militarily very soon.

Utter rubbish.

Andy
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Netleyned

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #28 on: October 19, 2010, 05:30:03 pm »

I would hate to be a Falkland Islander reading the latest news or listening to BBCWS


Ned
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malcolmfrary

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #29 on: October 19, 2010, 05:57:14 pm »

Quote
the door will be open for foreign invasion militarily very soon
This presupposes that there is the desire amongst foreigners to actually invade, when all they need do is make an offer to the accountants running the show.
Quote
I would hate to be a Falkland Islander reading the latest news or listening to BBCWS
I would certainly be looking for a Linguaphone Spanish edition.
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Netleyned

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #30 on: October 19, 2010, 06:48:46 pm »

no Carrier so no need for a Radar picket destroyer


We did however build Lincoln Chichester Salisbury and LLandaff.
I spent some time on the old 'Plumduff'
These were diesel driven Aircraft Direction Frigates

Ned
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DARLEK1

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #31 on: October 19, 2010, 07:27:26 pm »

Utter rubbish.

Andy

 Falklands, case in point!
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Bryan Young

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #32 on: October 19, 2010, 07:39:54 pm »

Falklands, case in point!
Still waiting for which ships had to be towed 8000 miles. BY.
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DARLEK1

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #33 on: October 19, 2010, 08:18:06 pm »

Wait all you like, I never said all 8000 miles, read your history and go find out! ;D
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Colin H

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #34 on: October 19, 2010, 10:49:21 pm »



Don't know what anyone expects. As the retiring labour minister said in his note "there ain't no money left."

If you ran your personal finances like the last government ran the countries finances you would be in jail.

As to the MOD they should sack the lot, top to bottom and start again with people who know about contract law, purchasing power etc. We might then just get value for money.

Colin H.
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Shipmate60

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #35 on: October 19, 2010, 11:00:55 pm »

Colin,
Value for money, contract law, sure if you want your equipment from Tesco's.
Can you put a price on an anti-ship missile killer that hasn't been developed yet, then of course give a through life maintenance contract for something that hasn't been developed or built, THEN give a final contract price?
The point of new military equipment is to stretch what is considered feasible today to what will be common in 25 yrs time, and of course price it.

Bob
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pugwash

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #36 on: October 19, 2010, 11:14:32 pm »

Ned only just seen your post - yes we had the "Cathedral" class but they were never designed as close escort for the
Carriers because being diesels they were too damn slow their job was to be out in the direction of the threat far in front of the task force
The battle conversions were a ship that could stay with the carrier when she went to flying off speed and were a stopgap measure until
all the Bristol Class came on line( well we know what happened to that class)
Mod (N) was trying to copy what the Yanks had in the fight up to Japan but unfortunately the Cathedrals would have been overwhelmed
in minutes with their 2 x 4.5 and one twin bofers. AT least the yanks had the sense to make their radar picket screen of heavily armed
AA Destroyers and still they suffered very badly.
Geoff
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mickyrubble

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #37 on: October 19, 2010, 11:16:29 pm »

DIDNT JOHN NOTT TRY SOMETHING SIILAR BACK IN '82
 {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{ {:-{
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Colin H

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #38 on: October 19, 2010, 11:22:26 pm »



Bob whilst I agree with you in some respects the MoD buys a lot more equipment than just weapons.

Desks, stools, pens, paper, lap tops on and on. With the buying power of the MoD these items should be bought in bulk at a massive discount.

This does not happen one dept buys an item from one supplier, whilst another dept will buy the same item from another supplier. Usually at vastly varying prices.

That old saying "The bigger the backhand, the bigger the price" comes to mind.

Colin H.
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tobyker

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #39 on: October 20, 2010, 12:33:09 am »

 For some reason the Mod is not allowed to use it's buying clout to drive down prices and hammer suppliers for the paper,pens, computers, office furniture etc.
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Shipmate60

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #40 on: October 20, 2010, 12:33:18 am »

Colin,
Many moons ago I ordered a small coffee table for my ship.
After a while it arrived, well packed and in good condition.
The price of this £20-00 table was well over £100-00, so I decided to investigate this further.
What transpired was the cost of the table was £18-00, a very reasonable cost.
But in those days non productive costs were added, these included costs for storage, stores staff, security staff and administrative costs.
This was actually a completely fictitious figure required by Govt accounting.
Since then there has been at least 2 value for money initiatives which has changed the accounting procedures and procurement procedures.

When I worked at our HQ I had a maintenance budget of £12 million a year, with all the checks and balances there was now way I could divert 8% (£1 million) astray.
We even had to declare any "gifts" ie lunch provided.

I am not saying it never happened but certainly not on the scale assumed.

As to economy of scale, this does happen, but there are only approved suppliers that can be used.
This is because the MoD has responsibility to politicians who don't want to be embarrassed by associated suppliers and also want a cast iron audit trail.

Most of my colleagues were trying to do a good job under Govt rules which did and still will increase costs, but overall a pen still costs 12p

Bob
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Shipmate60

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #41 on: October 20, 2010, 12:35:45 am »

tobyker,
Yes we are as long as we use approved suppliers, for 1 example the Army are responsible for the purchase of all Office Furniture and most departments have their own budget for things such as stationary equipment.

Bob
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pugwash

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #42 on: October 20, 2010, 12:52:55 am »

Bob, thats where the wheel comes off.  the army navy and airforce should get exactly the same desk, chairs whatever and have combined
buying power as should all govnt departments. Perrfect example in the police - if they all bought uniforms personal radios etc in bulk order
quality should be the same price will come down Philip Green has been checking on various depts and showed where you could make savings
which build up into big money with no loss in efficiency.  The other problem is the senior staff of all three services and the civil service are far
too cosy with the main defence contractors, there are too many of them get jobs in the defence industry when they retire.  My last captain
left the navy went to Bae and within a few years he was the Chairman of Bae.
Geoff
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Shipmate60

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #43 on: October 20, 2010, 09:55:44 am »

One problem with the system is the scale.
Take pens as an example.

Roughly 500,000 in Mod and services.
Allowance of 1 x per a month totals 6 million pens (of 1 colour).
These have to be stored and delivered.
But delivered where?
Afghanistan, Belize, Falklands etc and accounted for.
You will soon see that the distribution system costs far outweigh the cost of a pen.
Even posting will quadruple the cost in packaging and postal costs.

Bob
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tigertiger

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #44 on: October 20, 2010, 10:03:07 am »

Having worked in logistics in the Army. It is amazing how long and convoluted the supply chain can be, and how many pairs of hands both the item and the paperwork have to go through.

Necessary, because of all the light fingers.
But it has an associated set of costs.
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malcolmfrary

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #45 on: October 20, 2010, 10:43:01 am »

Taking the coffee tables - if you want to buy in bulk, you will get the benefit of bulk pricing, but you then have to pay for storage and any/all handling between storage and end point as opposed to buying from Tesco homeware when they have to bear those costs and stick them in the price, and, of course, delivery charges. 
To make an in-house system work smoothly, you always need surplus capacity in the system, which, in turn, has to be paid for unless the concept of long delays is acceptable.  The downside there is human nature, under Parkinsons Law, which ensures that the needed surplus capacity will always be taken up doing something pointless.  My addition to this law is that this pointless filler will become the main objective, and to fulfil the real objective, the department size will "need" to be increased, and along with that, its budget.  The process is beloved of senior management, and is known as empire building.
Then there is the cast iron audit trail, very necessary given the human acquisitive syndrome, but it has to be remembered that cast iron is known to be brittle.....
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Colin Bishop

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #46 on: October 20, 2010, 11:04:44 am »

In all this shambolic and non strategic defence review one thing has struck me as being deeply ironic and that is the bleating in certain quarters that the new carriers are 'too big'. If there is one thing that hindsight teaches us it is that we tend to build our ships too small and any initial savings are wiped out by long term costs and operational limitations.

The type 42 destroyers are an example, the design length was reduced in the first batches to save money. Subsequently the later ships were given longer hulls to improve seakeeping and to make room for additional equipment and weapons. The first ships were thus not really satisfactory and couldn’t be upgraded. With the old County class cruisers it was the other way round, they were considered to be large and over expensive ships when built but in wartime they proved their worth. Two diminutives, York and Exeter, were built to save money but they needed the same power plants, had only 75% of the main gun power and had markedly worse endurance. So for a relatively small saving you got a significantly inferior ship.

If you build to meet today’s minimum requirements then your ship will have a relatively short life as a frontline unit as it cannot accommodate updated weapons and equipment fits. So then you need to build a replacement! When you make a design bigger the internal space and carrying capacity goes up disproportionately to the external dimensions. Running costs come down disproportionately too, a ship twice the size doesn’t need twice the crew nor does it need twice the power for a given speed and it’s got a heck of a lot more space inside. Anyone who has been aboard an Invincible class carrier will be struck just how small the hangar space is. By comparison, in the assault ships Bulwark and Albion, HMS Eagle and indeed the Mounts Bay RFAs, the internal hangar and garage areas seem huge.

There have been signs in recent years that this lesson has been taken on board with the Darings, the Astute class subs and the big RFAs which have been designed with a margin for future proofing and thus long term savings but I do wonder if this will continue with the new Type 26 frigates. Economy in this context usually means second rate and short lived, maybe OK in wartime when you need to build lots of Flower class corvettes to meet an immediate threat but not for vessels that are expected to serve for 35 years or more.

Colin
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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #47 on: October 20, 2010, 11:31:21 am »

Future proofing didn't do much for the Shiney Sheff and Alacrity.

  Regards  Ian.
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Colin Bishop

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #48 on: October 20, 2010, 11:33:57 am »

Quote
Future proofing didn't do much for the Shiney Sheff and Alacrity.

Which were both excellent examples of non future proofing designs and prove my point!

Colin
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Colin H

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Re: HMS Ark Royal to be scrapped!
« Reply #49 on: October 20, 2010, 01:33:43 pm »



Take out of the purchasing equation all weapons and life saving equipment and stick with the other requirements of the MoD. There are still vast savings to be had if and only if the staff are capable and can be bothered.

It would seem that some staff are incapable and not many can be bothered. Its not their money after all is said and done. ITS MY MONEY!

When I was a contracts manager for the largest central heating installer in the UK. I would ofter run sites of 1100 or 1200 installations. My buyer would contact the suppliers with a specification, place the order with the best quote and away we went.

I never had in store more than a weeks worth of materials at any time that was the job of the supplier. I placed my orders on a weekly basis and the supplier scheduled his deliveries to suit. The main difference was that the more money I made the company the more money I earned.

The public purse is not bottomless as we are now finding out to our cost.

Colin H.
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