Halliburton wins MoD vote for £4bn Royal Navy deal

[jhain]

http://news.independent.co.uk/business/news/story.jsp?story=588854

( and the beat goes on...)

By Katherine Griffiths and Michael Harrison

02 December 2004

A senior procurement official within the Ministry of Defence is understood to have recommended that the contract to oversee the £4bn construction of two aircraft carriers for the Royal Navy is given to Halliburton, the controversial American company once headed by the US vice-president Dick Cheney.

Professor Roy Anderson, the MoD's chief scientific officer and chairman of its Investment Approvals Board (IAB), is understood to have written to colleagues backing the bid submitted by the Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR).

Provided the full IAB endorses Professor Anderson, a formal recommendation will go to ministers before Christmas to make Halliburton the so-called "physical integrator" on the carrier project.

This could have serious repercussions for the Rosyth shipyard in Fife, close to Gordon Brown's constituency, because Halliburton is expected to press for final assembly of the ships to be carried out at Nigg, a disused oil platform yard. More than 1,000 jobs at Rosyth, which is owned by Babcock, could be under threat.

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[Trajan]

1. WTF ? ...

We have mature shipyards laying fallow on BOTH coasts, with TENS OF THOUSANDS of shipyard employees out of work : Britain as well suffers the same moribund activity .... and somehow: Halliburton is squeezing into this work ? ...

WHEN the FUCK will they stop ? ...

GEEEZ !

[Anarcho-Socialist]

2. As a Brit, this makes me want to puke

£4bn would have made a huge difference to the local economy of a region of the U.K. Having the aircraft carriers built locally should have been a priority.

[malachi]

3. WTF? Does Brtian need aircraft carriers?

[jhain]

4. another

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=588828

Iraq bill hits £5bn as MoD says troops will stay after poll
By Colin Brown, Deputy Political Editor

02 December 2004

The cost of the Iraq war and other military action has risen by £520m to a total of £5bn - equivalent to 1.5p on the standard rate of income tax.

The soaring cost of Britain's emergency military operations abroad was disclosed last night by Chancellor Gordon Brown, who is expected to have to raise borrowing substantially in the pre-Budget report today to cover rising public expenditure.

The Chancellor said he was setting aside an extra £520m in the special reserve to pay for the additional costs. MPs said last night that the rise would be enough to pay for three general hospitals or 20 schools.

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