Green Marine of Lymington and Southampton made - and still makes - the composite hulls for the Trents and the Severns and yards such as Berthon in Lymington, Souter in Cowes, Osborne in Littlehampton (now Cougar Osborne) and DML in Plymouth fitted them out.

With the Trent costing about £1.4m and the Severn £1.9m to put on the water the programme did wonders for many parts of the marine trade.

Building will continue through next year on the Severn, the new Fast Carriage Boat and Fast Slipway boats, as well as many inshore RIBs, so the RNLI will continue to provide work for a while to come.