---

Defence Jobs

I knew that I was taking my life in my hands with that remark. It is a defence debate, and I am well defended by the Minister. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard) for securing the debate, and to hon. Members on both sides of the House, representing constituencies in Shropshire and the west midlands, who have spoken very eloquently about many local issues. They ably represent their constituents on this subject. I want to touch on two issues—the merger of the Defence Logistics Organisation and the Defence Procurement Agency. We accepted at the last election that there was a need to introduce effective through-life management of major capabilities. Indeed, in 2003 the National Audit Office found that one of the barriers to through-life management was the relationship between the DPA and the DLO. It certainly makes sense that there should be one organisation to manage that capability from its inception to the completion of its service life. We felt that that justified a merger with the capability functions of the DLO and the DPA. We feel that the full merger of the two organisations has the potential to create a very large and cumbersome organisation, and there seems to us to be no reason why the purely logistical functions of the DLO should be included in a merger with the DPA. Consumables such as ammunition and nuts and bolts do not need to be provided by the same organisation that has responsibility for procuring aircraft, ships and tanks. The risk is that the Government will create a huge, unwieldy empire that will not perform either task particularly well. We support merging the capability functions, but think that there should be a separate logistics command specifically to take account of the logistics items, as opposed to the large procurement areas. On the defence training review, hon. Members will know that my constituency is beautifully positioned, being adjacent to both Wales and the west midlands. I therefore find it easy to take a balanced and neutral position between the two bids. Hon. Members from the west midlands and Shropshire have put their cases very ably, and no doubt others will make strong cases for their bids. I am sure that the Minister will make a very wise decision on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government.