How I see the concept: a stationary military guarded gate, when no faction carriers are online, could be looped on itself (you dock with it and appear just near it), or simply locked. When faction carrier appears online, and when under conditions (lets say, has sufficient fuel commodity in cargo hold), the player can initiate the connection by, say, typing "/connect gate1", then fuel commodity could be consumed (on periodic basis, limiting the number of jumps, or with constant rate, limiting the use time, or combined). At this point I think that ship should not suffer any penalties like dropped shield, carriers are not really a force provided that they are to initiate the gate connection and call the fleet (they are alone or with escort). Snubs then are informed that connection was established and proceeded to jump to the carrier location.
In this meaning the carrier is a vessel that carries the gate, not the ships themselves.
