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MOD Llangennech

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) on securing this important debate and I thank her for giving up a couple of minutes to allow me to support the powerful case she made. A number of my constituents are also employed at MOD Llangennech. When Llangennech representatives invited me to visit the site, I walked round it and met the people on the ground, and I was enormously impressed by the dedication of staff and what they told me. The people there said exactly what my hon. Friend said in the last few minutes: the proposal to transfer the various sections of work out of Llangennech is wrong, because we will end up with work being done less efficiently, less effectively and probably at far greater cost. The people at Llangennech and the units of the armed forces that they serve—their customers, if you like—have not been involved in or even properly consulted about the proposal. That is just plain wrong. We should remember that Llangennech has an excellent performance record throughout its sections. It has led the way in employment of information technology, as my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli mentioned. It has a wealth of staff expertise that the MOD really should not be prepared to lose. It has always been extremely economical to run and in 2003 it was the only site to meet its financial targets for three consecutive years. My hon. Friend is right: there is a compelling case in economic and organisational terms to allow the staff to bid for the work that they already do so well. There is also a case on the basis of natural justice.