Written question asked by Gerald Howarth (Conservative) on Tuesday, 23 November 2004, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 1 December 2004. It was answered by Adam Ingram (Labour) on Wednesday, 1 December 2004 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.

Ministry of Defence

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what progress has been made in establishing a system of asset tracking for defence logistics.

Answer: Mr. Gerald Howarth: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what progress has been made in establishing a system of asset tracking for defence logistics. [199830] Mr. Ingram: The Ministry of Defence has employed two consignment tracking systems since the first Gulf War; Royal Naval Invoicing and Delivery System (RIDELS) for the Royal Navy and Visibility in Transit Asset Logging (VITAL) for the Army and RAF. VITAL was subsequently enhanced by the acquisition of the US system Total Asset Visibility (-) (TAV (-)) as an Urgent Operational Requirement in January 2003. This has automated much of the process and improved performance. We are now investing additional money on enhancing these systems still further. This will include, for example, the full integration of TAV (-) into existing consignment tracking systems.

Secondary information