Committee
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee 10 March 2026 [Draft]
10 Mar 2026 · S6 · Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Item of business
MV Glen Sannox (Hull 801) and MV Glen Rosa (Hull 802)
(Ferguson Marine (Port Glasgow) Ltd):Graeme Thomson
Watch on SPTV
First, I would say that, in the letter of 13 May, I diligently reviewed the schedule and costs, aware of the appetite and keenness for a response on where the schedule and costs had got to, which the committee had requested. The aim of my review was to check the logic, the flow of analysis and the way that the budget had been developed. As I had been in post for eight days, that approach had a logic that I could follow and understand and was, I think, appropriate—at the level that was appropriate for the eight days that I had been in post—allowing me to say that I was satisfied that the work that had been done was sound, based on the information that I was presented with. Therefore, I had confidence that that was a good, rigorous process.10:00Subsequently, as I became familiar with the yard—I spent months working in the yard—it became evident that systemic and latent issues prevailed in the business and needed to be addressed. I have made a number of changes, which I am happy to talk about separately, to address those issues.However, fundamentally, what has now caused the schedule to move is the fact that, when we went into the dry dock, as we planned to, in July and August 2025, we identified excessive and beyond recognised corrosion in the stern tube and on the hull. Those were brought about mainly by the ship having been stagnant in the water for so long, which I understand is an issue in itself, and the quality of the cathodic protection that we put around the vessel at the time. We identified that we had to take recovery action. The window for that was not available in the dry dock that we had in July and August, so we had to assess the full scope of the work, understand how it would fit into a future schedule, which we would have to develop, and then align the availability of the specialist subcontractor to address the issue with the availability of a dry dock.Having assessed that, we were aware that we would get the window for that work beyond the end of quarter 2 in 2026—it would be in July and August. Therefore, we set about trying to minimise the impact of that and did a very deep dive into every aspect of the schedule to see what we could do to optimise it. As we went through that work, we identified that, between system installation and commissioning execution, which is where we start to work the live systems, there was a disconnect at a very low level in the plan, which meant that that also needed to be corrected. To compound that, we are unable to put liquefied natural gas on a ship before it goes into the dry dock, for good safety reasons, so the LNG commissioning was therefore also affected.All those elements flowed together: the availability of the specialist subcontractor for doing the repair in the dry dock; the availability of the dry dock; the extended window; the reworking of the commissioning schedule to align with system installation; and the fact that we had to delay LNG commissioning, because we could not have LNG on the ship when we went into the dry dock. Those elements combined to create the challenge that moved the schedule into quarter 4, and the root of the situation was, fundamentally, a corrosion issue in the stern tube and with the hull. As I said, we have learned lessons from that about how we better protect the hull, but, equally, we recognise that that must be repaired before we hand the ship over.That led to an analysis of the cost, which David Dishon led the work on. We looked at what we could do to ensure that we covered the scope of the work. We recognise that, because the ship will be there longer, there will be additional costs, between insurance, utilities and the other aspects associated with running the business. Those aspects combined to give us the cost that, unfortunately, we had to share in January.
In the same item of business
The Convener
Con
Welcome back. Our third item of business is an evidence session with Ferguson Marine (Port Glasgow) Ltd. Today’s session is our final opportunity before diss...
(Ferguson Marine (Port Glasgow) Ltd):Duncan Anderson
Inaudible.
The Convener
Con
We cannot hear you yet. Hold on. Let us just wait until I get the nod.
Duncan Anderson
Is that better?
The Convener
Con
Yes, it is definitely better, because we can hear you. Off you go.
Duncan Anderson
Thanks, convener. As you pointed out, I am the recently appointed chair of Ferguson’s. I joined as a non-executive director in March last year. Although we a...
The Convener
Con
Excuse me, but I will start off by saying that that is the fourth time I have heard that speech. I heard it when I went to Clyde Blowers, I heard it when I l...
(Ferguson Marine (Port Glasgow) Ltd):Graeme Thomson
First, I would say that, in the letter of 13 May, I diligently reviewed the schedule and costs, aware of the appetite and keenness for a response on where th...
The Convener
Con
My problem is that there were eight months between your writing that letter in May and our finding out that the cost had gone up and that there was a delay. ...
Graeme Thomson
Until we went into the dry dock in August, we were still sitting within the quarter 2 schedule. We were having some issues—some challenge with the schedule—b...
The Convener
Con
You went into the dry dock in August.
Graeme Thomson
Yes.
The Convener
Con
You must have got a report pretty quickly from the dry dock. If it was my boat, I probably would have gone down and looked at it myself. That still left four...
Graeme Thomson
I will set out what happened in those four months from August. We got the report. We looked at what we originally thought would be hull paint recovery and st...
The Convener
Con
You wrote to the committee on 15 September, saying that significant milestones for the committee had been met, that there was increased confidence in the del...
Graeme Thomson
In August, we had not understood the scope. We thought that we could do the work in parallel and that that it could be contained within a week or two, so we ...
The Convener
Con
But the price would go up.
Graeme Thomson
Not necessarily—
The Convener
Con
Something in that 15 September update to the committee was fundamentally flawed—it was wrong. Either the price was going to remain the same and the boat was ...
Graeme Thomson
Given the information that I had at the time, I believed that the letter was correct—that we could contain it. Until we had done the work and analysis to ful...
The Convener
Con
Were you comfortable on 15 October?
Graeme Thomson
No, because at that point I started to understand the scope of the work.
The Convener
Con
Do you not think that it would have been appropriate to let committee members know that the letter that you had written to them in September was factually in...
Graeme Thomson
I think that it was appropriate to do the work so that I could fully inform the committee of the impact, because at that point we were still assessing the im...
The Convener
Con
When did you complete that work?
Graeme Thomson
I completed it at the end of November.
The Convener
Con
Wow. To me, it seems to be a bit of a guddle, especially given the fact that, based on some of what you have said regarding LNG, you must have known that LNG...
Graeme Thomson
No, we knew that LNG could not go in there. The original schedule was that we would go into dry dock in March and the LNG transfer would happen after that—be...
The Convener
Con
Are you confident in the details that you gave in the letter of 30 January—that the increased cost of £197.5 million will not be exceeded and that the ferry ...
Graeme Thomson
I have a high confidence in that number and the schedule for Q4 2026, but I do not think that any CEO who is dealing with a complex vessel such as this would...