Britain will have no aircraft carrier capability until 2020 and costs have climbed from £3.65bn to more than £6bn.
Labour’s Blaenau Gwent MP Nick Smith, who took part in the investigation, said: “The Public Accounts Committee has identified an eye-watering misuse of the public’s money.
“We’ll have fewer aircraft carriers and they won’t have full operational capacity until 2030 – what a mess.”
Labour committee chair Margaret Hodge gave a scathing account of the findings, saying: “Once again, a major MoD project will be completed much later, cost much more and offer less military capability than originally planned.
“Changes to the aircraft carriers and the aircraft flying from them in the 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review have changed the risks and costs involved in ways that are not fully understood.
“Rather than two carriers, available from 2016 and 2018, at a cost of £3.65bn, we will now spend more than £6bn, get one operational carrier and have no aircraft carrier capability until 2020 – almost a decade.
“The second carrier will be mothballed, while the operational carrier will be available at sea for only 150 to 200 days a year. On top of that, the technology to enable the new aircraft to fly from the carrier is untested.
“The newly constructed ship will have to undergo immediate modification and the costs of this will not be known until December 2012.”
Read More
