RNLI plans future production
The UKs Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) has announced its plans to build an £11.2m lifeboat building and maintenance facility at its headquarters in Poole, Dorset, for future in-house production of all weather lifeboats.
The institution already designs its own all weather lifeboats and produces its hulls in-house but is looking to the future to manufacture its lifeboats in the new facility, which is to be built on RNLI land.
The project will offer 90 new jobs to workers at the Poole site and help the RNLI extend its apprenticeships in the coming years. It will also save contractors’ profits and overheads and is expected to pay for itself in less than 10 years.
Paul Boissier, chief executive, RNLI, said: “To pay for the new facility, we would use £6.2 million of our efficiency savings and aim to fundraise for the remaining £5m through trusts and corporate partnerships. In the long term, saving £3.7m of donors’ money each and every year is a higher return on investment than we could expect elsewhere, and is equivalent to the cost of two-and-a-half new Shannon class all-weather lifeboats.”
Subject to planning approval, work is due to start in 2013, with the first phase of all weather lifeboat refits and overhauls expected to be moved across from RNLI SAR Composites at Lymington by 2019.
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