Fort Blockhouse sale "unlikely to be successful" as MoD accused of "twiddling their thumbs" over Gosport site

Major General Andy Sturrock said any framework to sell Fort Blockhousein Gosport would be extremely challenging. Thought to be the UK’s oldest sea fort, the military building has been up for disposal since 2016 and a buyer has yet to be found.

Despite the Ministry of Defence (MoD) pushing to flog its unused historic sites, prospective agreements for the 1431 fortification are stalling. Dame Caroline Dinenage said “everyone is still twiddling their thumbs waiting to figure out how to dispose of the complex site”.

Speaking during a Culture, Media and Sport committee meeting on Tuesday (January 6), the Conservative MP for Gosport said selling the Fort Blockhouse 1 site faces several challenges for disposal - listed buildings, sea wall, planning constraints, proximity to the naval base, and elements of contamination - but criticised the lack of clear strategy.

She said: “One of the reasons why I think it hasn’t been sold so far is that it’s a huge estate. The approach has always been keep it or sell it, but we’re still sitting there waiting for the outcome for the site which is doing nothing for the constituency, MoD, or the public purse. Could there be a more sophisticated hybrid model in the approach to how you get rid of something like that?”

Maj Gen Sturrock, Director of Strategy and Plans at the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO), the MoD is looking into more creative ways of disposing of Fort Blockhouse. “A straight forward sale is just not going to work, it’s not attractive enough,” he added.

“We’re considering how we come up with some form of model of partnering, where the department stays more involved. We’re starting to think about how that works. It’s very early days, so I don’t know what success we will have, but we have recognised that a straight forward sale of that site is unlikely to be successful.”

Ms Dinenage said it was a shame the MoD were only now changing tactics. “That is a lot of money that could have been saved if that had been recognised ten years ago,” she added.

Fort Blockhouse 1 was used heavily in use until the mid-1960s. The site housed the 33 military field hospital under the 2nd Medical Brigade - disbanded in 2018 - and a branch of the National Coastwatch Institution, with the Royal Navy submarine museum nearby.

Bosses and a location scout at Warner Bros’ were given a tour of the site in September 2025, but were almost blocked from visiting. Selling historic buildings to reduce running costs has become a priority for the MoD.

The Strategic Defence Review published in June said an infrastructure Recapitalisation Plan should be given to the defence secretary by February 2026. It recommended the MoD assess how best to generate income and maximise the value of its assets, especially for properties up for sale.

Maj Gen Sturrock said the department is looking at every aspect of selling military buildings, even building new modern replacements. “We have limited capacity in the number of staff dealing with asset disposals,” he added.

“A lot of them are focused on trying to dispose of larger sites. We lack the capacity to deal with lots of individual buildings. I can understand the frustration from people saying ‘why can’t the MoD get rid of that’. In many circumstances, we’d love to, but we haven’t got the staff capacity.

“Our estate is too big. We have too many buildings for the size of the military we need. That means the money we have is spread too thin. We actively want to reduce the size of our built estate, and if there are good ways of taking historic buildings and passing them on for other uses, that is to our advantage, as is to the preservation of those buildings.”

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Ms Dinenage said historic sites cannot just be ignored, as buyers become harder to find if they continue to deteriorate. She cited the former gunboat yard building in Haslar, Gosport, now used by the Army Sailing Association (ASA). It needed a £400,000 grant from Historic England for the project to go ahead - clearing gutters and replacing rooftiles.

“This is a big problem when the military comes to dispose of their sites,” Ms Dinenage added. “They’re almost giving them away, and in some cases giving them away with an endowment, because of the huge costs that come with them to bring these listed buildings up to the minimum legal standard.”

Damian Hinds, Conservative MP for East Hampshire, asked if government departments could be doing more to offload sites when they could, and not just seeking the highest bidder.

Maj Gen Sturrock said: “The current government is particularly keen to accelerate that process. We’re under a lot of pressure.” He added: “In our case, we’re interested in reducing our running costs over time and the liabilities.

“If we factor that in, that’s a big financial bill. Taking a slightly lower capital receipt to get it into the hands of someone who will look after it will reduce our running costs. It’s about maximising value, not maximising the capital receipt.”