Asked by Lord Coaker To ask His Majesty’s Government what progress
they have made towards the delivery of ordered Ajax vehicles. The
Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Baroness Goldie) (Con) My
Lords, the recent user-validation trials to assess the
effectiveness of the modifications proposed by General
Dynamics to address the noise and vibration concerns over Ajax
are complete, so the department can now safely move to the next
stage of testing:...Request free trial
Asked by
To ask His Majesty’s Government what progress they have made
towards the delivery of ordered Ajax vehicles.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence () (Con)
My Lords, the recent user-validation trials to assess the
effectiveness of the modifications proposed by General Dynamics to
address the noise and vibration concerns over Ajax are complete,
so the department can now safely move to the next stage of
testing: reliability growth trials. These are designed to test
both the reliability of the vehicle and its installed systems to
ensure a final-build standard that meets the department’s
demanding standards for this new platform.
(Lab)
I thank the Minister for making a phenomenal effort to be here to
answer the Question. Notwithstanding her Answer, 589 Ajax
vehicles were supposed to be delivered in 2017, at a total cost
of £5.5 billion. Only 26 have been delivered so far and none is
operational, at a cost of £3.5 billion and counting. Potentially
300 military personnel have been harmed by excessive noise and
vibration. Can the Minister tell the House when all these
vehicles will be delivered to the front line and at what cost? Do
the Government still have full confidence in the programme or are
they examining alternatives?
(Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his kind comments; I felt as though I
was in perpetual transit until I walked through the front door of
this building.
This has been a rocky road, as I have acknowledged before. To be
honest, I think that where we have got to now represents a
seismic leap forward; that is, the successful conclusion of
user-validation trials. This is an important vehicle. As the
noble Lord is aware, it will be transformative for our British
Army. It will offer technological advancement—something that
Challenger 2 and Warrior do not currently possess. The noble Lord
is quite correct: we were very concerned about the health and
safety issues that were arising, hence the pause in the trials
and the instruction to the MoD director of health and safety, Mr
David King, to carry out a review. I can confirm that we have
implemented now a number of the recommendations that Mr King
made. We are very clear that, while this is an important addition
and an important vehicle for the Army, we will not accept
anything that is not fit for purpose. We remain in close contact
with General Dynamics and I
think we can now see a way forward.
(Con)
My Lords, I declare my interest as a serving member of the Army
Reserve. There is no doubt that it has been a rocky road, and
perhaps we should expect that, if we are to maintain a sovereign
land industrial capability. But who is to blame? The answer is
successive Governments. We have allowed our land industrial base
to atrophy. Moving forward, will we learn that lesson? Can my
noble friend perhaps say a few words on that? In the same way
that we have maintained a maritime industrial base with a
continuity of skills, continuing to build ships, will we now
learn that lesson in the land domain? How will the recently
published Land Industrial Strategy ensure that we do?
(Con)
My noble friend makes an important point. I am not going to stand
here with a finger pointing blame at individual Governments.
There has been a collective, cumulative process, as my noble
friend describes. As far as the Army is concerned, I hope that
the Land Industrial Strategy—which we published in May this year
and which sets out the intent, ways of working and actions by
which the Army, wider Ministry of Defence and industry will
collaborate to maximise the value from investment in Army
modernisation and transformation—will ensure that the Army is
equipped for the future and receives the capabilities that it
requires in a way that drives opportunity for UK industry and the
economy but also benefits the Army.
(LD)
My Lords, a lessons-learned study was announced in May this year
on what went wrong with the Ajax project. Can the Minister tell
us what progress is being made with that study, when it is likely
to be finished and whether it will be published in full or, at
least, mostly in part? Can she also tell us whether the
Procurement Bill, currently finishing its passage through this
House, contains clauses that make it substantially less likely
that another problem like this would arise?
(Con)
I think the noble Lord refers to the King report—the report from
the director of health and safety in the MoD. As I indicated to
the noble Lord, , we have implemented a number
of these recommendations. In particular, we have stood up the
noise and vibration working groups; that is an important
development. Future trials of armoured vehicles will have
real-time measurement of noise and vibration; that is very
important. A dedicated cell has been established to support
safety-risk governors for senior responsible owners with complex
projects. They carry a huge responsibility and they need that
support. On the wider issue mentioned, the Procurement Bill
addresses particular issues of procurement but, at the end of the
day, how procurement is done effectively in monitoring governance
assessment is very much a matter of good regime within the MoD.
We now have in place practices, procedures and processes to try
to ensure that we are approaching these complex contracts in the
best way that we can.
(CB)
My Lords, could the Minister say more about the damage to and
loss of hearing mentioned by the noble Lord, , and what steps are being taken
to ameliorate that or recompense those who have suffered?
(Con)
When the problem emerged during trials, immediate action was
taken: support was given, medical help was provided and
monitoring continues. I do not have up-to-date information, but I
will make inquiries and write to the noble and gallant Lord about
that. Recently, it was made clear during the user-validation
trials that no one was to feel under obligation to continue if
they had concerns about health and safety, and they were free to
speak up. As far as I am aware, the trials were able to proceed
without interruption.
(Con)
My Lords, the sunk-cost fallacy is a powerful distorter of human
behaviour in institutions as well as among individuals. When we
look back at, say, the procurement history of the Eurofighter, we
see that there was never a moment when it would not have been
better to cancel it, every time it came up for review. Now, with
Ajax, we are looking at a vehicle that is too heavy, that cannot
fire while moving, and that, as we have heard, impacts on human
health because of the motion and the noise. Will my noble friend
the Minister look at tweaking procurement so that we can stop
throwing good money after bad—perhaps, as the noble Lord, Lord
Wallace, suggests, in the coming legislation?
(Con)
As I indicated, Ajax is a very important development. It is a
highly protected and versatile platform. It is able to move,
fight, command and be repaired anywhere on the battlefield. It is
future-proofed, with an advanced sensor suite and open digital
technology to face evolving threats. That is taking us into a
technological age for the Army that we do not currently have with
any of our equipment. That is why we are very keen to procure
this vehicle. But as I said earlier, we will not take anything
that is not fit for purpose.
(Lab)
My Lords, the Ajax programme, no matter how much one dresses it
up, has been a complete and utter disaster. It has been a real
shambles. But my question relates to future procurement. With the
Ukrainians, we have seen technology—AI and such things—very
rapidly changing how they fight. For example, the time to bring
in counterbattery fire has been brought down by about 90%. Are we
taking notice of these issues and working out new methods of
procurement? We have to change things so rapidly because of the
way modern warfare is changing.
(Con)
I very often find cause to disagree with the noble Lord, but, on
this occasion, I accept his proposition that the conflict in
Ukraine has informed us. It is the most recent example of global
conflict that we have encountered in modern times, and it has
been extremely educational and informative for the MoD. As to how
that reaches out into procurement, it has highlighted where
issues can arise in relation to procurement, particularly at
short notice and in securing procurement at pace, and we are
learning these lessons. But, as I indicated to the noble Lord,
, a lot of how we
procure has to do with a civilised and intelligent relationship
between the MoD and industry. I am pleased to say we have that,
and we have had a great deal of co-operation from industry.
(CB)
My Lords, I welcome what the noble Baroness has said about
procurement—and of course the Procurement Bill now goes to the
other place for consideration there in January—but will we learn
significant lessons from what has happened with Ajax? Does she
recall that, in June of this year, the Public Accounts Committee
of the House of Commons said:
“The Department has once again made fundamental mistakes in its
planning and management of a major equipment programme.”
The chair of the committee, , went on to say that this has been deeply flawed from
the start. Will the Minister at least undertake, as we proceed,
to give the House updates on the progress of Ajax so that we know
when it will be put into use and whether the safety issues that
my noble and gallant friend raised earlier have been
overcome?
(Con)
I am pretty sure that, in the other place and here, the
Government’s feet will be held to the fire. We expect Ministers
to come to the Dispatch Box and explain what the progress is and
where we are in the process. In relation to procurement as a
whole, there have been some very good examples of procurement.
The MoD has made big changes on the back of NAO reports, many of
which were critical, but we absolutely accepted some of the
recommendations. We have made major changes: for example, we have
implemented steps to more accurately estimate project costs,
including improving risk forecasts through the use of
reference-class forecasts, risk-costing pilots and the analysis
of systematic strategical operational problems. We have also made
reforms to how we deal with the senior responsible owner, so that
there is much more continuity in the contracts. A lot of big
changes have happened. I point to two recent procurements, the
Type 31 and the Poseidon aircraft, as very good examples of
really successful, positive procurement.
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