GoC Awards Disposal Contract for HMCS Athabaskan

DND Press Release

Public Services and Procurement Canada has awarded a contract valued at $5,737,350 to Marine Recycling Corporation from Port Colborne, Ontario, for the disposal of the Royal Canadian Navy’s former Her Majesty’s Canadian Ship (HMCS) Athabaskan.

Feb 2006 HMCS Athabaskan Photoex: Aerial Imagery of Standing NATO Maritime Group 1. Photographer: MCpl Charles Barber, Staff Photographer SNMG1 (NATO)

The contract includes towing to the contractor’s facility located in Sydney, Nova Scotia, demilitarization of equipment, remediation of hazardous waste and recycling of any remaining materials.

“The former HMCS Athabaskan served Canadians and protected our waters with distinction for more than 44 years. I am grateful to all Royal Canadian Navy members and veterans who have served with honour and dignity aboard this ship throughout its long and storied history,” said The Honourable Harjit S. Sajjan, Minister of National Defence.

“This announcement is good news for Marine Recycling Corporation and the Canadian marine industry as a whole. This contract also benefits our local economy, as we are expecting to sustain approximately 30 jobs in the region,” said The Honourable Mark Eyking, MP, Sydney-Victoria (Nova Scotia).

“Marine Recycling Corporation has an excellent well-earned reputation, providing retirement for ships which have served Canadians throughout the years. The MRC team can take pride in being a positive influence through the continued support of community organizations in Port Colborne and across the Niagara region,” said The Honourable Vance Badawey, MP, Niagara Centre.

HMCS Athabaskan is currently docked at Canadian Forces Base Halifax, and is the last of the four Iroquois-class destroyers. These ships were a made-in-Canada solution to the defence and security challenges of the Cold War and post-Cold War era of the late 20th century.

The retirement of HMCS Athabaskan had been anticipated for some time. As part of the National Shipbuilding Strategy, the process of renewing and modernizing fleets for the Royal Canadian Navy and the Canadian Coast Guard over the next 30 years has begun, with construction of vessels on Canada’s east and west coasts underway.

The Iroquois-class destroyers will be replaced by up to 15 Canadian Surface Combatants. The delivery of the first vessel is expected in the mid-2020s.

The modernized Halifax-class frigates, along with Kingston-class Maritime Coastal Defence Vessels and Victoria-class submarines, will allow the Royal Canadian Navy to continue to deliver on its core mission until the arrival of the new ships.

The dismantling of HMCS Athabaskan is expected to be completed by July 2019.

Canadian Army Keeps Options open to Purchase More TAPVs

By: David Pugliese, Defence Watch

Several days ago I had an update on the Tactical Armoured Patrol Vehicle (TAPV) project. Deliveries are continuing to Canadian Army units and a number of TAPVs will be set aside for reserve force training.

The TAPV project, announced in July 2009, will procure 500 vehicles to fulfill a variety of roles on the battlefield. An option for up to an additional 100 vehicles is included in the contract.

There were some suggestions that option was completely off the table because of tight funding. But not so, says the Canadian Army.

“The Department of National Defence has not yet made a decision to exercise that option, but the option can be exercised at any time until three years following the delivery of the last vehicle, which is anticipated for summer 2018,” Maja Graham, Senior Communications Advisor, Directorate Army Public Affairs, told Defence Watch.

Navy Supply Ships Delayed...Again

By: David Pugliese, The National Post 

Construction of the navy’s supply ships won’t start until 2019, the federal government says, yet another delay in outfitting the maritime service with a critical capability.

Work on the first Joint Support Ship at Seaspan shipyards in Vancouver was supposed to begin this year, but federal officials recently refused to outline to parliamentarians the building and delivery schedule for those vessels.

However, in the newly released update on the progress on the government’s shipbuilding strategy, the Liberals report that construction will begin in 2019.

The update, which covers progress made throughout 2016, is a mix of old and new information and includes an introduction by Procurement Minister Carla Qualtrough. Design work is continuing on a number of vessels, including the supply ships, writes Qualtrough, who took over the portfolio from Judy Foote in August.

Yet another delay for the Joint Support Ships cements the need for the leased supply ship, MV Asterix, which was acquired as a stop-gap measure so Canadian warships could be refuelled and resupplied at sea, navy officers privately say.

The Asterix, a commercial ship converted by Davie shipyards to perform a military supply role, is at the heart of the federal government’s case against Vice Admiral Mark Norman.

Norman has been accused by the RCMP of warning Davie that Liberal cabinet ministers wanted to derail the Asterix project.
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That development leaked out to the news media and the resulting embarrassment forced the Liberal government to back down on its plans and Asterix proceeded. Royal Canadian Navy sailors are currently training on the ship on the East Coast and Asterix will be available in the coming months to resupply the navy’s vessels.

Norman, who was suspended from his job by Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Jon Vance more than a year ago, has denied any wrongdoing. No charges have been laid against Norman and the claims made against him by the RCMP are so far unproven.

Norman had at times warned parliamentarians about the need to deal with the gap in supply ships because of his concerns that construction of the Joint Support Ships had fallen behind schedule.

The navy had hoped to get the first ship in 2021 and the second in 2022. The update issued by Qualtrough and posted to her department’s website on Dec. 17 still uses those dates. Industry officials, however, have said that those delivery dates are highly unlikely.

Last week Postmedia reported the Department of National Defence was holding off on spending $20 million on the Joint Support Ships because of ongoing delays but the department did not issue details about the timeframe. In an email, the DND noted the money would not be spent this year “due to delays in project approvals and contract awards, delay in construction of ships.”

Taxpayers will eventually spend $2.3 billion on the ships once the project is fully underway.

In late November, the federal government told MPs it can’t provide them with a schedule for the delivery of the new ships or the coast guard’s Polar-class icebreaker because it deems such information secret.

The refusal to provide such basic details to MPs on shipbuilding programs that are costing billions of dollars was a warning construction of the vessels had fallen further behind schedule, said industry representatives and Conservative MP Todd Doherty.

Qualtrough’s press secretary, Ashley Michnowski, noted the Liberal government has made a commitment to be transparent in communicating the progress on the national shipbuilding program. “Pulling together data and information for this first annual report was complex as it involved input from multiple departments and companies,” she noted. “We are now in a better position to provide more timely reporting moving forward.”

The update contains details of maintenance contracts for the Victoria-class submarines.

It also highlighted the work to convert Asterix, noting that 700 people are employed at Davie by the program.

But neither the submarines nor Asterix is part of the national shipbuilding program. In addition, Davie has laid off many of those workers since the Liberal government has refused to proceed with the conversion of a second supply ship and has rejected other ship proposals from the company.