Brexit: No-deal Ferry Contracts

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Wednesday 1st May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

I was trying to get across to noble Lords the complexity of the maritime market. Flexibility is possible, but it is not unlimited. For example, DFDS had to charter new vessels from very far away to fulfil these contracts. Other vessels had to be reconfigured. Those vessels will now need to go back to what they were beforehand to take on passengers. The noble Baroness looks incredulous, but the contract offered extremely good value to the taxpayer.

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

Are the Government planning an out-of-court settlement with the ferry companies or do they intend to contest the case?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

I am pleased to be able to tell the noble Lord that we have reached a settlement with the ferry companies, as I pointed out earlier, and that the termination fees are £43.8 million. It is clear that we have co-operated with the ferry companies, and we are grateful to them for the amount of mitigation that they have been able to do to reduce the amount of money that we have had to pay. We have had negotiations with them. We tried to sell as many tickets as possible to reduce the cost to the taxpayer and the ferry companies have cancelled sailings. We are grateful for their co-operation and believe that this is a fair settlement of the contract.