‘There is nowhere to properly maintain vessels in the island’

‘There is nowhere to properly maintain vessels in Guernsey,’ he said.

Mr Wilcox added that the biggest problem with boat maintenance is working around the tides because it limits the hours that crew can work on the underside of the boat.

‘It would be wonderful if Guernsey invested in a decent boatyard for the island.

‘The dream would be to have a cradle on a slipway that would bring the boats into a dry unit, but that is not going to happen.

‘It would take about two weeks to carry out the whole maintenance process [for a Trident vessel].’

He said the advantage of having a slipway would be that the boats could be taken completely out of the water and so there would be no restrictions on working hours and no restrictions on access to the underside of the boat.

For the maintenance of Trident V, the crew will fix steel supports about two feet high to the keel of the boat.

This will allow crew members enough room to inspect, paint and maintain the underside of the vessel.

‘The worst thing is getting to the very bottom of the boat, which is extremely difficult.

‘This is a problem the MCA have brought up with us before,’ he said.

The Maritime and Coastguard Agency carries out an annual inspection of Travel Trident’s vessels to assess their quality and safety.

‘In the near future they want to carry out a proper inspection of the underside of the hulls.

‘At some point the MCA may force our hand and we will have to take the boats over to the UK.’

Mr Wilcox is not keen on the idea of sending the Trident vessels to the UK for maintenance.

‘The boatyards in the south of the UK are not quite suitable for the Trident vessels,’ he said.

He also expressed concerns that sending boats to the UK would mean outsourcing maintenance, which would leave no work for the staff in Guernsey.