Ministry of Defence slammed for 'getting ripped off' as MPs warned Royal Navy is facing a 'perfect storm' of ship woes

WEAK finance tsars at the heart of Britain's military have been accused of getting ‘ripped off’ by defence contractors, leading to sweeping delays and spiralling costs.
Watch more of our videos on Shots! 
and live on Freeview channel 276
Visit Shots! now

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has taken a pummelling during the latest meeting of the defence committee in parliament today.

It comes as the powerful body of MPs looks to scrutinise the effectiveness of Whitehall's strategy to buy new kit for the armed forces.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Military top brass are still battling to plug a £7bn black hole in its 10-year plan to equip the army, navy and RAF.

An image of what the Type 31 frigates will look like. Photo:: Babcock/PA WireAn image of what the Type 31 frigates will look like. Photo:: Babcock/PA Wire
An image of what the Type 31 frigates will look like. Photo:: Babcock/PA Wire

Last year, a damning report by the public accounts committee, the Commons’ spending watchdog, revealed the MoD lacked the ability to ‘accurately cost programmes’ and that the shortfall could reach £14.8bn by 2028.

The cash crisis today enraged former armed forces minister, Mark Francois, who sits on the defence committee.

‘One of the reasons the MoD gets ripped off so frequently is because it hardly ever cancels a programme unless it absolutely has to, and it hardly ever fires or sacks a contractor that goes massively over budget,’ the former minister for Portsmouth said.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

‘It always fudges it somehow and eventually you end up with fewer and fewer units that individually cost more and more.

‘The MoD is a weak customer and is very bad at managing the contractors that it deals with who often end up leaning the MoD over a barrel or even something worse.’

The criticism comes as MPs heard about looming woes facing the Royal Navy and the procurement of its latest generation of hi-tech frigates.

During the virtual meeting, defence expert and journalist Francis Tusa told MPs the management of defence programmes across the board was ‘not brilliant’.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He warned the committee the navy was facing a serious issue introducing its state-of-the-art Type 26 frigate and its cheaper, general purpose Type 31 frigate.

‘We’re going to see a perfect storm in about five years’ time with both Type 31 and Type 26 delivering their first-of-class ships almost to identical timescales and the Royal Navy will not have the resources to take both ships into service,’ he told MPs.

‘It does not have the manpower, skilled manpower and expertise to be able to manage two complex warships’ introduction at the same time. This is where an industrial strategy would have helped them.’

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Earlier this year, the MoD’s permanent secretary, Stephen Lovegrove let slip that the five new Type 31 frigates won’t come into service until May 2027 – four years late.

The delay will mean that by the mid 2020s the navy will have just 15 frigates and destroyers in action.

This breaks the government’s long-standing promise never to go below 19.

The news outraged former First Sea Lord Admiral Lord Alan West, who said: ‘For a great nation like ours, just five frigates on task is a national embarrassment and disgrace.’

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

An MoD spokesman said it was ‘committed to ensuring’ the navy has the ships ‘required to fulfil’ defence needs.

A message from the Editor

Thank you for reading this story on portsmouth.co.uk. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

With the coronavirus lockdown having a major impact on many of our advertisers - and consequently the revenue we receive - we are more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription.

Subscribe to portsmouth.co.uk and enjoy unlimited access to local news and information online and on our app. With a digital subscription, you can read more than 5 articles, see fewer ads, enjoy faster load times, and get access to exclusive newsletters and content. Visit our Subscription page now to sign up.

Our journalism costs money and we rely on advertising, print and digital revenues to help to support them. By supporting us, we are able to support you in providing trusted, fact-checked content for this website.

Related topics:

Comment Guidelines

National World encourages reader discussion on our stories. User feedback, insights and back-and-forth exchanges add a rich layer of context to reporting. Please review our Community Guidelines before commenting.