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Defence Procurement

The Minister is fortunate that he can rely on the hon. Gentleman to blame the previous Conservative Government, after 11 years, for the failures of this Government. That argument might have worn for a few years, but it does not wear today. The Government have only themselves to blame. I have already mentioned the Chinooks. There has been a combined in-service date slippage of almost 14 years on three projects, with cost overruns of nearly £3 billion, which, as the Defence Committee said, are not limited to legacy projects. There has been scathing criticism from the National Audit Office of the bungled sell-off of the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency, which, we now understand from the former Minister, Lord Moonie, the Ministry of Defence was opposed to, but which it was dragooned into doing by a Treasury anxious to get its hands on MOD money. The Royal Air Force soldiers on with clapped-out VC10 and TriStar aircraft, while Ministers fashion a convoluted rental deal for delivery in three years' time. The Royal Navy is operating Lynx aircraft with less than 200 hours of airframe time left. There are still no contracts signed for the cornerstone of the Government's 1998 strategic defence review, the aircraft carriers, on which the French claim to be negotiating with Ministers in this country on a timeshare basis, like some holiday apartment. We are no nearer to a decision on the Army's essential new battlefield vehicle, the future rapid effect system—FRES—despite what the Minister has said. I will come to that in more detail in a moment. Urgent operational requirements are funded for the short term by the Treasury, as the Minister said, and are not part of the overall core defence budget. There is no comprehensive, through-life plan for the bits of equipment that are required under the urgent operational requirements.