As daft as it sounds I don't think the MOD can afford a redundancy programme, particularly if they are aiming it at the top of the 'pyramid'. "Golden bowlers" are very expensive in the short term and any changes are likely to take a couple of years to implement (particularly for those who have a union to fight their corner!) and it is the here and now that the money is needed.
What I suspect they will look to do is sign fewer people on for extensions of service and offer less in the way of long term "contracts" (ie more SSC and less PC). The RAF will lose experienced people at one end and be replaced with fewer 'newbies' (who are cheaper) at the other (i.e replace a 2 x 22 yr service SNCO with 1 x LAC). The manning requirement will balance for less money even if it is full of people with either less than 5-8 years service or more than 25 (and locked in by the schooling allowance).
Contractorisation is not the answer either IMHO. Whilst the wage bill goes down it means (as many have said before) you have a smaller pool of deployable pers / enhanced guard force "volunteers" etc. You only have to look at the medical services (and to some extent the old Supply and MTD drivers) to see how contractorisation is not working for those left in uniform (again, IMHO).
There are 2 other ways to get the numbers down cheaply - use the admin discharge more widely for those no longer fit to do their duty (and, as uncomfortable as it may be, this may have to include those wounded in action - no flaming please, there's a whole thread on this elsewhere). And then of course they could always make life so 'uncomfortable' that it encourages people to PVR (put quarter charges up several hundred percent, remove schools allowance, reduce leave entitlement, increase OOA to 12-18 month tours etc etc - all easy to introduce as they don't change any "T&C" we may believe we have).
As always I'm bound to be proved wrong and await the missive from AHQ...
