Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps his Department is taking to maintain boilers in housing provided by his Department.

The new Future Defence Infrastructure Services accommodation contracts came into service on 1 April 2022. Within these contracts, there is a requirement for an annual boiler service in all Service Family Accommodation (SFA).

In Financial Year 2022-23, Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO) invested £73 million of the £176 million SFA improvement budget, which includes providing 600 properties with new boilers.

There are 47,396 boilers in SFA, as of December 2022, 76% (35,855) are less than 10 years old and 24% (11,541) are over 10 years old.

DIO operates a three strike boiler programme. If a boiler is over 10 years old and fails three times in 12 months, it is replaced on the third fail. Approximately 2,500 boilers are replaced annually within SFA either through the three strike programme or project upgrades.