Written question asked by Willie Rennie (Liberal Democrat) on Monday, 15 December 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 18 December 2008. It was answered by Lord Beamish (Labour) on Thursday, 18 December 2008 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.

Departmental Consultants

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many (a) businesses and (b) individuals provided consultancy services to his Department in each of the last three years; and what the top 10 contracts by monetary value were in each case.

Answer: The Ministry of Defence does not hold this information centrally. Summaries for the years 1995-96 to 2007-08 of total MOD expenditure on External Assistance, of which consultancy is a part, is available in the Library of the House.The Defence Analytical Services Agency (DASA) publishes a list of companies paid £5 million or more in each year within their UK Defence Statistics. This information can be found at:2005-06"http://www.dasa.mod.Uk/natstats/ukds/2006/c1/table116.html"2006-07"http://www.dasa.mod.uk/natstats/ukds/2007/cl/table118.html"2007-08"http://www.dasa.mod.uk/UKDS2008/cl/tablel18.html"

Secondary information