Defence Procurement

David Mowat Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I am happy to confirm to my hon. Friend that I am confident that the announcement will improve defence procurement and that it will set us on a path of evolution for the future, enabling us to keep our options open and allowing us to explore and continually challenge the organisation to deliver better things for our armed forces at better value for the taxpayer.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

The Secretary of State said that the DE&S plus bid was somewhat less detailed than the Bechtel bid, which presumably means that if they were both evaluated on a level playing field, the Bechtel bid would be likely to win. Will my right hon. Friend tell us whether the major learning points or good points in the Bechtel bid will be incorporated into what is now going forward with DE&S plus?

[Mr Hammond]

My hon. Friend asks a very good question. The material contained in the Bechtel bid is “commercial in confidence”, and Bechtel will have spent a considerable amount of money generating the bid, and would naturally not expect the Department to abuse that confidence. I can tell my hon. Friend that the broader process, the work we have done on DE&S plus and the preliminary discussions we have had with bidders and potential bidders have pointed the way to the future development of DE&S in a way that I think has been most helpful, and will inform the process going forward.