Select Committee on Public Accounts Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 220-228)

MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

25 OCTOBER 2004

  Q220 Mr Steinberg: The last point I want to make is that you put great store by the fact that you believed that the training of our pilots produces the best pilots but also puts them in absolutely no danger at all because it is the safest way of doing it. Yet if you read 4.10 on page 33—and I only bring that up because you actually said that, and if I had had more time before, and I accept that I had already had my fair share, I wanted to talk about the training of pilots and the length of difference between American training and British training—and if you read the paragraph where it says, "For example, such was the haste to deploy refitted Lynx Mk7s on Operation TELIC, that two aircraft flew direct from modification at the Defence Aviation Repair Agency, Fleetlands, to embarking ships. 3 Regiment, Army Air Corps were, therefore, unable to familiarise themselves with new Defensive Aid Suites until they arrived in the Gulf, not having had the opportunity to practise with suitably equipped helicopters during their previous year's training." In other words, the pilots were actually sent to the Gulf who were not fully trained, who in fact were not to the standard that you would have expected or hoped, but yet they were sent, which contradicts what you were saying originally about the training of Apache helicopter pilots, and also the fact that presumably if they were not fully trained then you were sending them into the Gulf with the danger of them being killed.

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: I was actually talking about the training provided by the Defence Flying Training School and that system, that is to say the basic training and the training to type. I was not referring to the precise operational specific training, although perhaps the Air Marshal could say something about that since it is more in his province when it comes to sending people into scenarios.

  Air Vice Marshal Luker: I would agree that we had not given people sent out to the Gulf all of the training we would have liked to have given them, but we always make the assumption that there will be some time in theatre to be able to make good the bits that we have not done. That has a certain risk to it but that is the way that we have managed. What we are good at, I think, is inculcating in our people the ability to take on new equipment, new techniques, new environments very quickly, and we try to do that through a generic basic training. In that—and it sounds boastful—I do not think there is anyone who can beat us in the world.

  Q221 Chairman: That last question relates to the question I asked earlier about paragraphs 4.7 and 4.8 on some of the critical capability shortfalls, Air Vice Marshal, and with the scenario of pilots having to familiarise or train at the last minute, so I think I would like you to do a further note on that because we are clearly worried that pilots' lives are being put at risk. Would you do a note for us on that, please, and a considered response?[12] I wanted to ask you why, as a matter of interest, Army air helicopter squadrons are commanded by majors but RAF ones are commanded by Wing Commanders? Would it not be cheaper if Army crews operated the Chinook and Puma fleets?

  Air Vice Marshal Luker: I think this is another of those legacy issues that we have from all three Services where we call the same things different names and different things the same names. It is possible within the Army to find a wing that is made up of four people and it is commanded by a Lance Corporal. It is possible to find a wing in the Air Force which is made up of about 500 people. The short answer is that squadrons in the Air Force are different in size and numbers of people and numbers of equipment to those that you find inside the Army, and the nearest comparable unit is a regiment to an RAF squadron. That is why the rank ranging is done in the way it is.

  Q222 Chairman: That is a very fair answer. Peter, I apologise, you have not had much of an outing this afternoon, a man of your distinction, and I am sure you are rather upset about that, are you not? Perhaps I can give you a shout very late on. Can you assure the Committee that under Smart Procurement the problems with Chinook will not reoccur?

  Sir Peter Spencer: I cannot give any absolute assurances about any procurement programme because we deal with uncertainty and technological risk. What I can assure you is that we will do the risk examination with great care; that we will not be unrealistic in raising expectations as to time and cost and we will put in the right amount of contingencies and it will certainly have the full force of the corporate governance that all of my projects now have, with the new arrangements inside the Defence Procurement Agency with three full-time operations directors who look at these programmes very carefully every month and in particular detail every four months.

  Q223 Chairman: Thank you. We know that with this Chinook Mark 3 you did not obtain the software codes of the US made equipment, and that is what we have been told about today. Are you going to ensure that this is not a problem with the Joint Strike Fighter?

  Sir Peter Spencer: We are still working through the issues on Joint Strike Fighter and you do not necessarily have to have access to source code to achieve adequate safety assurances, as we demonstrated with the Attack helicopter.

  Q224 Chairman: Sir Kevin, you said in your supplementary memorandum[13] that we do not expect to eradicate the shortfall entirely.

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: Correct.

  Q225 Chairman: So we recognise that that shortfall is there, it is not going to be overcome, and that is something that we should be concerned about, should we not?

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: The future Rotorcraft programme is there to make things a lot better. I cannot, rather like the Chief of Defence Procurement, simply say it will become completely eradicated; what I can say is that we will have a more robust Force than we have at present, and determined to get value for money from it. I cannot promise when we will close the shortfall.

  Q226 Mr Jenkins: That is also derived from the White Paper, I assume?

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: No, but this is a genuine point.

  Q227 Chairman: I meant it as a genuine point.

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: I am very happy to send you the calculations based on the White Paper policies.

  Q228 Chairman: Gentlemen, thank you very much for appearing before us. As usual, Sir Kevin, you have come on a sticky wicket and we are grateful to you for trying to answer our questions. But at the end of the day we are left with a quarter of a billion pounds of our taxpayers' money spent on helicopters that simply cannot fly and that is something we are naturally concerned about. You have taken us to task for referring to the Apache, but we can only in conclusion quote Lady Bracknell, that once is unfortunate, twice looks like carelessness.

  Sir Kevin Tebbit: Mr Chairman, you did ask me about, on the one hand, were we taking enough account of the safety of our people in various areas, nuclear, biological and the rest of things? Part of this issue is because we do take care of safety, we are not prepared to cut corners and that is where we find ourselves. I think it is very unfortunate. The effort we put in on safety, on Defensive Aid Suites as well, shows that we are careful in that area as well as in the rest.

  Chairman: Thank you very much, gentlemen.





12   Ev 29-30 Back

13   Ev 22-27 Back


 
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