Written Statement - Defence Technical College

Today’s announcement by the UK Government to cancel the Defence Technical College project at St Athan is a huge disappointment. This will be an immense blow to the local community with loss of substantial employment and local supply chain opportunities.

This will mean the loss of:

• Up to 2500 training and support jobs;
• Up to 1500 construction jobs
• £700m - £800m DTC construction contract
• £60m DTC supply chain expenditure annually
• Approx £500m annual boost to the Welsh economy from operational activities
• Between £270k and £540k boost to local tourism

The Welsh Assembly Government has worked very hard to support MoD’s ambition to create a tri-service training facility at St Athan.  To date we have spent in access of £5 million in support of the redevelopment plans for St Athan, which includes plans for an aerospace business park; and showed our commitment to the DTC by earmarking up to £60 million over 6 years to provide the necessary infrastructure for the site.  The latter is safeguarded through under writing agreement with MoD.

The economic logic and unique site solution has always been acknowledged by all concerned. The project offered the opportunity to utilise existing first class assets and was promoting a comprehensive redevelopment in partnership with the MoD.

We will urgently explore with the MoD options for attracting new investment to St Athan and we will press hard to ensure that St Athan is considered as a solution for their future estate requirements for delivering training to service personnel.