In a statement shared with UK media outlets, a P&O Ferries spokesperson explained that the company had been in “extensive negotiations” regarding the extension of its existing lease. However, those attempts, as well as efforts to secure an alternative site, had not been successful.
“Unfortunately, despite utmost efforts by P&O Ferries to find a viable solution, no suitable alternative has been offered that would enable us to maintain the current service into 2024,” a spokesperson for P&O said.
As a result, the two vessels currently operating on the Liverpool-Dublin route will be redeployed.
P&O’s spokesperson told the Liverpool Echo that its loss of the route would “reduce competition and the choice of sailings available to customers on a crossing where there is currently only one alternative operator.”
The company has also stressed that it is “fully committed to continuing to serve our customers on the Irish Sea on our successful Larne-Cairnryan route.”
Reacting to the news, Mick Lynch, the RMT’s general secretary, told BBC News that the government “should scrap any shipping contracts they have with P&O and begin the process of banning them from operating in UK waters, as a matter of urgency”.
Lynch was also quoted as saying that the company, which was at the centre of a fire and rehire storm that disrupted its services last year, “cannot be trusted to operate economically vital ferry services”.
Two routes that P&O looks set to continue operating, however, are Zeebrugge-Teesport and Zeebrugge-Tilbury. Back in July, the company announced a three-year charter agreement with Bore Ltd on the MS Norsky and MS Norstream allowing for the continuation of the services.
Photo: Niels Johannes, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
