Oral question asked in the House of Commons, by Douglas Carswell (Conservative). It was answered on Monday, 22 February 2010 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.

Defence Equipment Budget (Cost Overruns)

Question: In evidence to the Defence Committee, the Minister confirmed that at the start of the 2009 planning round the deficit in the equipment budget was £21 billion, and that at the start of the 2010 round it was £6 billion. What is the present value of the deficit and how does he explain the £15 billion reduction?

Answer: Those are two separate questions. We are not in a position to go beyond the £6 billion figure at the moment, but we are working on the figures as part of the present planning round at the end of the financial year. This is a netting exercise as the hon. Gentleman will understand. There may be some projects for which we have over-provided and will be able to write back some provision, and some projects will be descoped for operational or other reasons, or cancelled for non-performance. It is therefore impossible to predict the exact position at the end of the financial year. As for the reduction in the forward projected deficit of £21 billion last year to £6 billion, that £15 billion was accounted for by several factors. In some cases, projects were repositioned in the pipeline until some later date, forgoing that capability for the time being. In the majority of cases, the reduction was because of the descoping of the programmes that we were undertaking anyway or an agreement to reduce the capability that we intended to order—

Secondary information