Abstract
In 1958, the UK Ministry of Supply found that, on average, actual costs of defence equipment were 2.8 times those forecast.1 In 1965, the TSR-2 was cancelled partly because of costs rising from the original £500 million to over £1000 million and possibly as high as £2000 million. In 1998, the cost overrun on Eurofighter was forecast to be around £1.5 billion. There are two other problems aside from cost overruns. Time slippage is endemic to UK’s procurement system and averages around three and a half years, though some projects have slipped ten years and others even more.2 Meeting performance specifications has also been poor with around 10 per cent of key technical requirements not met. It seems that little has changed.
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Notes and references
HCDC Eighth Report 97/98, Strategic Defence Review, vol. 1, para. 305.
National Audit Office, MOD Major Projects Report 1998, 30 June 1999.
HCDC Eighth Report 1997/8, Strategic Defence Review, vol. 1, para 333.
The Strategic Defence Review, July 1998, Supporting Essay Ten.
Chief of Defence Procurement, Interavia, September 1998.
A Dinosaur in Whitehall, Bill Kincaid, (London: Brassey’s, September 1997).
MOD’s Acquisition Handbook, A Guide to Smart Procurement, April 1999.
The Stategic Defence Review, Supporting Essay Ten, July 1998.
UK Breaks Up Horizon Consortium, Military Procurement International, 1999. 10. MOD Acquisition Handbook, A Guide to Smart Procurement, Edition 1, April 1999.
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© 2001 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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Kincaid, B. (2001). Smart Procurement: Revolution or Regression?. In: Matthews, R., Treddenick, J. (eds) Managing the Revolution in Military Affairs. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230294189_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230294189_11
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