Better Defence Acquisition

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

That depends on what we are buying. Clearly, there are things that we can buy off the shelf or from competitive international providers. We recently ordered the new fleet of MARS—military afloat reach and sustainability—refuelling tankers from a South Korean shipyard. That decision did not go down well with everybody, but it was sensible procurement. At the same time, we have to maintain important capabilities that are essential to our national sovereignty here in the UK. In those cases, we have to support the indigenous industry. One purpose of the changes is to make transparent the costs that are driven into a project by the specification of bespoke requirements and to force the customers to recognise those costs.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

I welcome the statement, but will the Secretary of State say more about the timescale over which he expects the reforms to deliver tangible savings to the taxpayer?

[Mr Hammond]

As I said to the shadow Secretary of State, if we went down this route, we would expect to award a contract next year and for it to be effective by the last quarter of 2014. We would then expect there to be a two-stage process towards the full GoCo-isation—if I may use that term—of DE&S. We would expect savings and efficiencies to be generated from the very beginning, and from the second year of operation we would expect there to be cashable benefits.