As much as it was an icon for Britain when in service, the former royal yacht Britannia should stay a museum piece rather than be resurrected, as has been proposed in the Daily Telegraph. It was on its last legs when retired, needed specialised base support and staff at its home base (Portsmouth), dedicated fuel vessels (since it was the last vessel using diesel in the navy) and the devotion of one escorting frigate (or larger) when HRH was onboard. With a crew of 271 and a detachment of Royal Marines, plus the crew of the escorting vessel, that is a lot of sailors employed when the navy has been cut to the bone. Back in 1997 it was, apparently, cheaper to build a modern replacement that required fewer crew and would be vastly more economic to run; more economic, of course, to retire Britannia and not replace it…
Despite having an element of pānis et circēnsēs – Roman, bread and circuses – about it, Downing Street has rejected the idea.
Downing Street has rejected a Boris Johnson-backed proposal to recommission the royal yacht and use it to conduct trade deals once Britain has left the European Union.
The ship Britannia, which acted as the Queen’s private yacht between 1954 and 1997, hosted trade talks in the early 1990s before being axed by Tony Blair in 1997. It is currently docked in Scotland.
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September 19, 2016 at 11:09 pm