Examination of Witnesses (Questions 160-179)
GENERAL SIR
KEVIN O'DONOGHUE
KCB CBE, DAVID GOULD
CB AND LIEUTENANT
GENERAL DICK
APPLEGATE OBE
29 JANUARY 2008
Q160 Mr Jenkin: If the United States
ordered fewer than it anticipated at the outset—there appears
to be such a possibility—would that affect how many we could
afford to buy, because obviously the unit cost would go up?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
It would certainly be a factor that would have to be taken into
account.
Q161 Mr Jenkin: How big a risk do
you think it is?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
I do not know. We have the advantage that we have not signed up
for x aircraft but to be part of the programme. We can
buy these aircraft off the production line as we need them. Unlike
most aircraft where to keep the production line open you buy a
certain number and then stick some into a shed somewhere because
they are the attrition reserve and so on, here because the United
States is buying so many we can pull off aircraft from the production
line as we need them, so there is more flexibility in that respect.
Q162 Chairman: Are you confident
that they will be available to fly off the aircraft carriers in
2014 and 2016 when they come into service?
Mr Gould: I am not confident that
that will be the case. We plan to use the GR9 on the first of
the carriers.
Q163 Chairman: When was that announced?
Mr Gould: We will not have a carrier's
worth of fully productionised, trained and equipped JSFs in 2014.
Q164 Chairman: For how long do you
expect to be using GR9s?
Mr Gould: Currently, we plan to
keep them in service until 2018 or something like that.
Q165 Mr Jenkins: As always, you choose
your words very carefully. You say you do not plan to have a full
commitment of Joint Strike Fighters. Do you intend to mix aircraft?
Mr Gould: I meant I did not expect
that the joint strike fighter programme would be physically able
to provide us with a wing's worth of Joint Strike Fighters in
2014. We plan to operate only Joint Strike Fighters from carriers
when we have enough JSFs to do that.
Q166 Chairman: What are the costs
involved in running on GR9s?
Mr Gould: I do not think we are
running them beyond where we planned. We always planned to use
them in that way.
Q167 Chairman: Is any consideration
being given to marinising Typhoon?
Mr Gould: No.
Q168 Chairman: If that was ever plan
B, is that now out the window?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
It is very much on the back burner.
Mr Gould: I do not think it would
be plan B; it would be further down the alphabet.
Q169 Richard Younger-Ross: As to
the Joint Strike Fighter, you said that the number would be determined
by cost. Can you give a percentage? Will it be half the number
if the cost is so much? What is the ballpark figure? What sort
of variation in percentage are you talking about?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
I cannot say. We just do not know what the unit cost is. We need
to see the unit cost and then judgments will need to be made.
Do we buy the number we first thought of for that price or fewer?
Do we take money from a different programme?
Q170 Richard Younger-Ross: What percentage
variation are you looking at in terms of cost?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
I am not sure at the moment because I do not know the unit price.
Q171 Richard Younger-Ross: Therefore,
it could be double the cost?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
I very much doubt it.
Mr Gould: All we can do at this
stage is look at comparable programmes in the past. Looking at
where the Joint Strike Fighter is today, what happened on the
F18 at an equivalent stage? What was the production cost growth?
Typically, at equivalent stages a 20 or 30% increase in cost has
been known to happen, but at the moment I have no evidence that
that will happen on the Joint Strike Fighter.
Q172 Richard Younger-Ross: We have
two aircraft carriers. What is the number of aircraft you expect
to have on them, if you can afford them?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
Thirty-five or 36.
Q173 Richard Younger-Ross: But you
do not know whether or not we can afford 36?
Mr Gould: We can certainly afford
that number, but there would be an additional number for training,
attrition and so forth.
Q174 Chairman: The original figure
was 150?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
Yes.
Q175 Chairman: That is cloud cuckoo
land, is it not?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
I do not think we need to make a decision on that. Because the
production line will run on we can buy the number we need, which
presumably will be the 36 to man one aircraft carrier plus the
training and so on and buy others as and when we need them. I
am not sure we need to decide on a number now.
Q176 Mr Jenkins: I had no intention
of going down this route but it is fascinating in that we have
the prospect of the first carrier having no Joint Strike Fighters
to land on its deck. Do we plan to have the second carrier within
the four wing? What sort of drumbeat do you anticipate in getting
the Joint Strike Fighters? At what rate will we get them and what
will be the level of training? When can we get the second one
up? I know that this is all speculation given the time ahead and
the cost, but somebody must have sat down and drawn up a plan.
Is there any chance of our having a look at that outline plan
with regard to the rate at which you expect these items to be
delivered and when the aircraft carriers will have their full
complement? Is there any point in our having an aircraft carrier
if we have nothing to land on it?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
We will fly the GR9.
Q177 Mr Jenkin: Would it not be cheaper
to run the existing aircraft carriers if we are just to carry
on with GR9?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
No.
Mr Gould: We come to the point
about the size of ship you build once every 50 years. We have
now built up the supply chain that gives us the opportunity to
build those ships in that timescale. If you delay building those
ships you have to pay a bit extra to run on the Invincible class,
but the additional amount you pay just on labour and materials
for delay and dislocation in the carrier programme would outweigh
that several fold.
Q178 John Smith: You say that the
number of joint strike fighters will be determined by how much
they eventually are. Surely, the number of Joint Strike Fighters
should be determined by what we need for our defence capability
and the fact that GR9s will go out of service by 2016 or 2018.
You must have a figure which is what we need for this country's
defence?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
Yes.
Q179 John Smith: What is it?
General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue:
The Chairman asked me how many we would buy and the answer is
that it depends on the cost. You would point a finger at me if
I signed up to something without knowing how much it would cost.
We are at an early stage in the programme. The Royal Navy knows
what it would like, as do all the services. This is all a balance.
Requirement, minimum requirement, cost and other programmes are
all intermeshed, and that is the work that is going on at the
moment.
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