(UK)Navy bid to be announced after Commons recess

[maddezmom]

The Government is considering announcing who will oversee the £4bn Royal Navy carrier project after Parliament breaks up on 21 December for Christmas, in a bid to defuse MPs' anger that the work is set to go to KBR, a subsidiary of the controversial US contractor Halliburton.

~snip~

While the MoD is responsible for recommending a contractor to ministers for final approval, Gordon Brown has become involved because more than 1,000 jobs at the shipyard at Rosyth in Fife - on the doorstep of his constituency - could be lost if KBR is given the contract. KBR may press for most of the shipbuilding to be done at Nigg, a disused oil platform yard it owns.

At the same time, there have been strong rumours in London and Washington that the Pentagon has conveyed a message to the British Government that it would like to see the US group succeed in winning the co-ordinating role over Amec and Bechtel, which also made bids.

The sensitive decision has now been pushed to Downing Street, with advisers to Tony Blair aware that if the job goes to KBR it will bring to the fore controversy surrounding the Iraq war. Halliburton, which used to be headed by the US Vice-President, Dick Cheney, has been one of the major subcontractors in Iraq and has been accused of using its political connections to make huge profits from the war-torn country.

more: http://news.independent.co.uk/business/news/story.jsp?story=592583

[UL_Approved]

1. This is interesting news

I think I will nominate this for the front page. If you think about it, this would be a major demonstration of the commercialization and profiteering of the Bush conflict. The idea of using a private, foreign company to develop major military hardware is a disaster, anyway. Why would ANY nation give contracts for sensitive military equipment to another nation? It poses a severe national security risk.

[Benhurst]

2. I hope this is the rope with which Tony "The Bridge" Blair will

hang himself.




:spank: correct typo