asked the Secretary of State for Defence what redevelopment of Chatham Dockyard is being considered; and what effect this will have if undertaken on the workload and employment there.

No new plans for the major redevelopment of Chatham or any other Royal dockyard are at present under consideration. However, we do have an overall development plan for each of them which serves as a guide for the coherent improvement and rationalisation of the dockyard's facilities. At Chatham, the main feature of the development plan is the concentration of production work in the areas to the north and south of numbers 1 and 2 basins. None of this directly affects the dockyard's overall work load or the level of employment there.