Hon
Bernard Jenkin, Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, will
be visiting Gosport on Friday night (24 October), when he
will be guest of honour at the Gosport Conservative Association’s
Autumn Supper at the Thorngate Halls.
His visit to the area is particularly timely given the intense
controversy that currently surrounds the issue relating to
concerns over the financial threat to the building of two
giant aircraft carriers.
Billed as ‘super carriers’, the ships would
have enormous capacity for carrying 40-50 fighter aircraft.
The Government’s Strategic Defence Review had indicated
that their purpose would be to conduct significant air operations,
and that the carrier capacity required would therefore be
considerably greater than offered by existing ships.
It has been suggested that the Government may not have the
budget available to meet the increasing costs of the two
ships, and is therefore looking at ways of scaling down their
size.
Bernard Jenkin highlighted concerns relating to the super
carrier project in his comments to the Conservative conference
held recently in Blackpool, and will again raise the subject
in his speech to the Conservative Association on Friday evening. |
