ANALYSIS: Miltary faces 'perfect storm' of budget vs need
Because DIO and their RPC crooks at "40% variance" to all costed jobs - guess what?
uniform wearing politicians we have bred who think that Shrivenham Poly is the 'be all and end all'. We've only got to look at some of the crass decisions made by our own in Main Building, PJHQ or 4-star single-service HQs to see that common sense has long since gone in some.
Leon,
All sound ideas methinks. A saving of of £10bn a year is not to be sniffed at. how are you going to tackle the other £90bn a year that the deficit currently runs at?
All sound ideas methinks. A saving of of £10bn a year is not to be sniffed at. how are you going to tackle the other £90bn a year that the deficit currently runs at?
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Wales legacy
IPPR predicts the next Parliament will need to cut costs in defence budget to tune of £9bn.
Here you go, more ideas to save money...
1. Too many politicians:
3. Out of work people - bring them in to work for their dole money. If they haven't got an interview that day over the 5 day week, get them weeding, picking up litter and painting. No one should get free money unless they are in education, sick, infirm or disabled and unable to work. Whilst this might not save money it would dramatically improve the state of our Nation.
4. Schools. My daughter goes to a Private School, I don't get CEA and my wife and I pay for it (we haven't had a foriegn holiday in 5 years and both our cars are over 3 years old). The recent 'politics of envy' calls against private education makes me cross. If I compare the facilities at her school compared to the State Schools, then I see stark differences - her school didn't (until bery recently) have astro-turf pitches (and we had to raise our own funds for them), no heated pool, no school network for the children and overall has less than the tac-payer's provided Academy in the same town. So why does the private school get better results? The parents have inculcated the importance of learning in their children, the teachers know that they have to achieve to keep their jobs or the school will fall and the importance of learning over gimmicks like heated pools, astro-turf and fancy school networks which waste taxpayer's money if the State Schools continue to under achieve.
5. Rather than pay child allowance in money, pay it in vouchers that have to be spent on the children through companies selling clothes, food and educational items. I would be really surprised if 100% is spent on the children. If it isn't spent on children then take it away or it gets spent on Sky TV, booze, fags and even worse drugs!
6. Charge p!ssed up people who turn up to A&E with non life threatening injury. Stop all cosmetic surgery on the NHS - the money should be only be there to preserve life, extend life and treat chronic conditions. Also, ask for ID before treating - no ID equals no treatment, to stop 'health tourism'.
7. Improve safety on the roads and reduce the number of A&E admissions by insisting on an eye test and education program every 10 years on renewal of the photo-card driving licence. This would employ more people, raise more revenue and reduce road casualties - a good deal all around!
There are so many more. The waste in this country is scandalous. These ideas could help rebalance the books and then we might get better GROWTH, which is the other side of the equation. Along with GROWTH comes an increase in tax receipts and then we might be in business and back in SURPLUS.
We could do so much better in the MoD. It is underpinned by in-house fighting, nepotism and outdated thinking (partly due to Shrivenham Poly majoring on Clauswitz and Sun Tzu!). We should be able to the same we do today with substantially less - procurement, infrastructure, IT and preserving front-line activity should be our key efforts. Why do we have full-time Regulars doing training, HR/Admin, PEd when full-time Reserves would do (and can be mobilised if we really need to take them with us in Ops). Do we really need dedicated FP Field Sqns, when the brown jobs could do this function within 80% of what we get (the loss of Rapier/SHORAD should have spelt the end of the Regt in my opinion, sadly, when we had to lose our core output of combat aircraft to pay for the Regt capability). Go hard and fast on the 3 main forces - if it floats it belongs to the Royal Navy, if it is land based it is Army, and if it flies it is Royal Air Force. If we did this we would see an economy of effort, IMHO. I know putting the Royal Marines or RAF Regt in the Army, or the Fleet Air Arm and Army Air Corps in the RAF, woukd be unpopular but from a purely non-nepotistic point of view it makes sense. Some of our key personnel are reaching the irreducible minima that we feared and clubbing capabilities under one of the 3 arms makes sense to me? I do not propose a Joint Force as we have seen this fail so many times before when other contries have tried it.
LJ
1. Too many politicians:
A. Look at one parliament for the whole of Britain - devolution is costing money. Party Political 'whipping' is the issue here where your local MP is not allowed to support their local issues if it falls out of line with the party political ideals - this to me has always meant that a Scottish MP couldn't bring local issues to Westminster and why we are in the mess with all the devolution. The savings could be huge if we slimmed down the amount of parliaments.
B. Look at how many councils we have - councils within councils within councils - stick to one County Council. If you look at HS2, the locals in Aylesbury Vale missed out on an intermediate station because the FIVE local councils couldn't agree - that's Bucks County Council, Aylesbury Vale District Council, Chilterns District Council, Milton Keynes District Council and Wycombe District Council - how many Councils do you need to run a small county? More savings there me thinks!
2. More waste in the MOD. To run a Vigilant or Tutor costs at least £400 per hour - to do it at the local flying clubs it costs about £100. Why? Also, the outrageous Dii contract. Why do I need an OFFICIAL SENSITIVE system when I could pop down to PC World, buy a nice computer for 1/4 of the coat, run encryption software across us all and save lots of money. Plus when it goes wrong, I pop into PC World to buy another. I agree we need our own managed and secure system for SECRET and above, but for OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE and below do we really need such an expensive system? Hell, why not give us all iPads and then we could work from home on 3G! Lot's more savings to be made.3. Out of work people - bring them in to work for their dole money. If they haven't got an interview that day over the 5 day week, get them weeding, picking up litter and painting. No one should get free money unless they are in education, sick, infirm or disabled and unable to work. Whilst this might not save money it would dramatically improve the state of our Nation.
4. Schools. My daughter goes to a Private School, I don't get CEA and my wife and I pay for it (we haven't had a foriegn holiday in 5 years and both our cars are over 3 years old). The recent 'politics of envy' calls against private education makes me cross. If I compare the facilities at her school compared to the State Schools, then I see stark differences - her school didn't (until bery recently) have astro-turf pitches (and we had to raise our own funds for them), no heated pool, no school network for the children and overall has less than the tac-payer's provided Academy in the same town. So why does the private school get better results? The parents have inculcated the importance of learning in their children, the teachers know that they have to achieve to keep their jobs or the school will fall and the importance of learning over gimmicks like heated pools, astro-turf and fancy school networks which waste taxpayer's money if the State Schools continue to under achieve.
5. Rather than pay child allowance in money, pay it in vouchers that have to be spent on the children through companies selling clothes, food and educational items. I would be really surprised if 100% is spent on the children. If it isn't spent on children then take it away or it gets spent on Sky TV, booze, fags and even worse drugs!
6. Charge p!ssed up people who turn up to A&E with non life threatening injury. Stop all cosmetic surgery on the NHS - the money should be only be there to preserve life, extend life and treat chronic conditions. Also, ask for ID before treating - no ID equals no treatment, to stop 'health tourism'.
7. Improve safety on the roads and reduce the number of A&E admissions by insisting on an eye test and education program every 10 years on renewal of the photo-card driving licence. This would employ more people, raise more revenue and reduce road casualties - a good deal all around!
There are so many more. The waste in this country is scandalous. These ideas could help rebalance the books and then we might get better GROWTH, which is the other side of the equation. Along with GROWTH comes an increase in tax receipts and then we might be in business and back in SURPLUS.
We could do so much better in the MoD. It is underpinned by in-house fighting, nepotism and outdated thinking (partly due to Shrivenham Poly majoring on Clauswitz and Sun Tzu!). We should be able to the same we do today with substantially less - procurement, infrastructure, IT and preserving front-line activity should be our key efforts. Why do we have full-time Regulars doing training, HR/Admin, PEd when full-time Reserves would do (and can be mobilised if we really need to take them with us in Ops). Do we really need dedicated FP Field Sqns, when the brown jobs could do this function within 80% of what we get (the loss of Rapier/SHORAD should have spelt the end of the Regt in my opinion, sadly, when we had to lose our core output of combat aircraft to pay for the Regt capability). Go hard and fast on the 3 main forces - if it floats it belongs to the Royal Navy, if it is land based it is Army, and if it flies it is Royal Air Force. If we did this we would see an economy of effort, IMHO. I know putting the Royal Marines or RAF Regt in the Army, or the Fleet Air Arm and Army Air Corps in the RAF, woukd be unpopular but from a purely non-nepotistic point of view it makes sense. Some of our key personnel are reaching the irreducible minima that we feared and clubbing capabilities under one of the 3 arms makes sense to me? I do not propose a Joint Force as we have seen this fail so many times before when other contries have tried it.
LJ
Last edited by Lima Juliet; 7th Dec 2014 at 12:35.
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Concur LJ - and introduce a common sense manning cap.
If you can only field x squadrons then you only need x/2 thousand people in your Air Force. If you only have 30 DD/FF hulls you only need 20,000 in your navy.
And the actual kicker. As the military you pay the going rate for the cheapest kit that fulfils the actual requirement. And if someone wants you to buy stuff from UK suppliers that's more expensive and worse -well they pay, not you.
If you can only field x squadrons then you only need x/2 thousand people in your Air Force. If you only have 30 DD/FF hulls you only need 20,000 in your navy.
And the actual kicker. As the military you pay the going rate for the cheapest kit that fulfils the actual requirement. And if someone wants you to buy stuff from UK suppliers that's more expensive and worse -well they pay, not you.
You hit the nail on the head by mentioning waste, Leon. I've never understood why our society accepts it so readily. Lack of accountability invariably leads to waste and government departments are perfect examples of this. The State should do minimum necessary for its citizens and enable and private business to do the rest (suitablyregulated) If you put the output of the MoD on one side your balance sheet and the cost on the other side you'd see how little you were getting for your money. I'd fund a small R & D department to ensure the UK retained/developed skills and inventions and let UK defence industries go to the wall if they weren't internationally competitive. We'd save a fortune.
By the way, I'd also look closely at charitable staus for all sorts of enterprises....private education being one of them!
By the way, I'd also look closely at charitable staus for all sorts of enterprises....private education being one of them!
WASTE
Well said Leon.
The most coruscating report on MoD waste I've read is report D/DIA/5/295/10 dated 27th June 1996 entitled "Requirement Scrutiny".
The audit team looked at every single MoD department responsible for aviation expenditure. They concluded, to PUS (the Chief Accounting Officer), that the instigating officer's original complaint, that vast amounts were being knowingly wasted, year on year, was correct. That, compensatory savings were being made at the expense of safety, instead of attacking the root cause. (Where Haddon-Cave got this line! The evidence his 1998 date was wrong).
The audit was initiated in direct response to the actions of AVM Chris Baker, Director General Support Management, who was 2 i/c to AMSO/RAF Chief Engineer, ACM Michael Alcock. In December 1992 he had threatened 7 civilian staffs in London with dismissal if they continued to highlight the waste and refuse to implement AMSO's wasteful policies. Had they implemented them, they would have been committing fraud by false representation. The audit was a device to head him off and prevent sackings.
It worked in the short term (as he couldn't take action while it was ongoing), but the report, when eventually issued, was dismissed by senior staffs as irrelevant. In MoD(PE), the Director General Air Systems 2, Mr Ian Fauset (Chinook, Nimrod etc), took a similar view ("of no concern") and also sanctioned disciplinary action against staffs who refused to commit fraud. In 1999 his boss, the Chief of Defence Procurement, Sir Robert Walmsley, upheld this policy, as did Director Personnel, Resources and Development, Mr David Baker.
To this day, DE&S Secretariat at AbbeyWood continue to cite all of these rulings when supporting the actions of staffs who knowingly waste money. As do Ministers for the Armed Forces, the Head of the Civil Service, the Civil Service Commissioners and the HofC Defence Select Committee (the latter by their inaction, the rest by direct support of the policy).
Otherwise known as, the elephant in the room.
MoD deny having the above report. As it was marked "No Further Action", DIA say they destroyed it after 7 years. But MoD forget that the instigator gets his own copy, provided under cover of letter D/DIA/5/295/10 dated 16th July 1996........
A hearing took place in AbbeyWood on 9th September 2002 to determine if the disciplinary action taken against staffs should stand. It was chaired by DPRD (Baker, above). He determined that it should stand, and advised CDP (Walmsley) to issue such a ruling, which he did (and, a 2nd time, when the Union pointed out the illegality of his decision. DPRD later briefed PUS in April 2003 that MoD stood by this policy, thus completing the audit trail showing PUS was fully aware). As DPRD provided the minutes secretary, and were well known for conveniently "forgetting" to distribute minutes and then denying any meeting took place, the hearing (with a Trades Union) was fully recorded. DPRD did indeed refuse to issue the minutes and ever since MoD have denied the hearing took place. (The recording is crystal clear. The hearing lasted a minute short of 2 hours. DPRD accepted many actions and fulfilled none).
Sorry, too many verifiable facts on a rumour forum?
The most coruscating report on MoD waste I've read is report D/DIA/5/295/10 dated 27th June 1996 entitled "Requirement Scrutiny".
The audit team looked at every single MoD department responsible for aviation expenditure. They concluded, to PUS (the Chief Accounting Officer), that the instigating officer's original complaint, that vast amounts were being knowingly wasted, year on year, was correct. That, compensatory savings were being made at the expense of safety, instead of attacking the root cause. (Where Haddon-Cave got this line! The evidence his 1998 date was wrong).
The audit was initiated in direct response to the actions of AVM Chris Baker, Director General Support Management, who was 2 i/c to AMSO/RAF Chief Engineer, ACM Michael Alcock. In December 1992 he had threatened 7 civilian staffs in London with dismissal if they continued to highlight the waste and refuse to implement AMSO's wasteful policies. Had they implemented them, they would have been committing fraud by false representation. The audit was a device to head him off and prevent sackings.
It worked in the short term (as he couldn't take action while it was ongoing), but the report, when eventually issued, was dismissed by senior staffs as irrelevant. In MoD(PE), the Director General Air Systems 2, Mr Ian Fauset (Chinook, Nimrod etc), took a similar view ("of no concern") and also sanctioned disciplinary action against staffs who refused to commit fraud. In 1999 his boss, the Chief of Defence Procurement, Sir Robert Walmsley, upheld this policy, as did Director Personnel, Resources and Development, Mr David Baker.
To this day, DE&S Secretariat at AbbeyWood continue to cite all of these rulings when supporting the actions of staffs who knowingly waste money. As do Ministers for the Armed Forces, the Head of the Civil Service, the Civil Service Commissioners and the HofC Defence Select Committee (the latter by their inaction, the rest by direct support of the policy).
Otherwise known as, the elephant in the room.
MoD deny having the above report. As it was marked "No Further Action", DIA say they destroyed it after 7 years. But MoD forget that the instigator gets his own copy, provided under cover of letter D/DIA/5/295/10 dated 16th July 1996........
A hearing took place in AbbeyWood on 9th September 2002 to determine if the disciplinary action taken against staffs should stand. It was chaired by DPRD (Baker, above). He determined that it should stand, and advised CDP (Walmsley) to issue such a ruling, which he did (and, a 2nd time, when the Union pointed out the illegality of his decision. DPRD later briefed PUS in April 2003 that MoD stood by this policy, thus completing the audit trail showing PUS was fully aware). As DPRD provided the minutes secretary, and were well known for conveniently "forgetting" to distribute minutes and then denying any meeting took place, the hearing (with a Trades Union) was fully recorded. DPRD did indeed refuse to issue the minutes and ever since MoD have denied the hearing took place. (The recording is crystal clear. The hearing lasted a minute short of 2 hours. DPRD accepted many actions and fulfilled none).
Sorry, too many verifiable facts on a rumour forum?
Dorman's judgements about the existing FF 2020 in the present context are scathing, calling its defined force structure an unaffordable, land-centric, top-heavy military designed to fail".
As of April 2014 the RAF is over manned at Air Cdre level and above by 115%. Sqn Ldr onwards is also over manned at all levels.
As of April 2014 the RAF is over manned at Air Cdre level and above by 115%. Sqn Ldr onwards is also over manned at all levels.
Last edited by jayc530; 7th Dec 2014 at 09:14.
Can you provide any factual link to back up your statement jayc530? I was told the other day we are still seriously short of aircrew officers in the sqn ldr / wg cdr bracket. If we are overloaded, then why the extensions to age 60? And why is the OSB taking on lots of newly changed aircrew posts?
Some excellent posts on this thread, and perhaps time to declare a new political philosophy - Leonism? But lest we shift into a Pete and Dud type exchange, tucumseh brings us unerringly back to our own particular part of the patch. Those who have followed the all too many airworthiness related fatal accident threads in this forum know that the true cost of MOD Gross Negligence is in blood as well as in treasure. His testimony here and elsewhere illustrates the reality of the present UK Military, that at 1* and below you are a potential scapegoat, but above that you are fireproof!
So whether you have a professional concern or not about the airworthiness of UK military aircraft (and who here does not?), plain self preservation would suggest that the corrupt self governing and self regulating morass that is the UK Armed Forces High Command has to be urgently reformed. To misquote Pastor Martin Niemoller;
First they came for the JO's and I did not speak out,
because I was not a JO.
Then they came for the CS's and I did not speak out,
because I was not a CS.
Then they came for the SO's and I did not speak out,
because I was not an SO.
Then they came for me - and there was no-one left to speak for me.
So whether you have a professional concern or not about the airworthiness of UK military aircraft (and who here does not?), plain self preservation would suggest that the corrupt self governing and self regulating morass that is the UK Armed Forces High Command has to be urgently reformed. To misquote Pastor Martin Niemoller;
First they came for the JO's and I did not speak out,
because I was not a JO.
Then they came for the CS's and I did not speak out,
because I was not a CS.
Then they came for the SO's and I did not speak out,
because I was not an SO.
Then they came for me - and there was no-one left to speak for me.
Chug
I think we could just call it 'real world common sense'!
Tuc's posts always make me think of the incompetence that I have also seen at a lesser level on procurement; if only we had a method of getting change then I would hope that we could make some of the required savings.
As for May 15, I need a billionaire sponsor to start the 'Monster Raving Leonist Party' - any takers?
LJ
I think we could just call it 'real world common sense'!
Tuc's posts always make me think of the incompetence that I have also seen at a lesser level on procurement; if only we had a method of getting change then I would hope that we could make some of the required savings.
As for May 15, I need a billionaire sponsor to start the 'Monster Raving Leonist Party' - any takers?
LJ
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PA-
I too heard that there was a shortage of SO2s- that is why they are commissioning NCA.
Although I do think that there is a 'shortage' because new Sqn Ldr JPANs are established at the drop of a hat- rather than create them at MAcr/JO level.
I also heard recently that the SLT are aware that a lot of the morale issues throughout the RAF are due to over eager SO1s and SO2s who are more concerned about their careers than the personnel they 'lead'
TT
I was told the other day we are still seriously short of aircrew officers in the sqn ldr / wg cdr bracket.
Although I do think that there is a 'shortage' because new Sqn Ldr JPANs are established at the drop of a hat- rather than create them at MAcr/JO level.
I also heard recently that the SLT are aware that a lot of the morale issues throughout the RAF are due to over eager SO1s and SO2s who are more concerned about their careers than the personnel they 'lead'
TT
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An American Perspective on Life in the Military post Budget Cuts and Downsizing.
AMERICA'S MILITARY: A force adrift
AMERICA'S MILITARY: A force adrift
We could do so much better in the MoD. It is underpinned by in-house fighting, nepotism and outdated thinking (partly due to Shrivenham Poly majoring on Clauswitz and Sun Tzu!).
I cannot, for the life of me, understand the dogmatic adherence at Staff College(s) to the philosophy of a dead Chinaman and a dead German. Arguably, Clauswitzean logic brought us the Great War (the final, climatic battle theory), whereas Sun Tzu speaks in riddles. A couple of years ago I did a foreign staff college and we spent 6 weeks on Clauswitz. As a result, I fully understand friction, fog of war and an overwhelming desire to commence a book-burning.
We should be able to the same we do today with substantially less - procurement, infrastructure, IT and preserving front-line activity should be our key efforts. Why do we have full-time Regulars doing training, HR/Admin, PEd when full-time Reserves would do (and can be mobilised if we really need to take them with us in Ops).
I was trying to get back for a conference in the UK that was to be invoiced to another UIN. The Spt unit wouldn't/couldn't book my travel as I was not physically located 'on site' ('not in the contract, Pal' was the helpful reply). I then got in to trouble booking my own flights!
We try to inculcate the manoeuvrist concept and mission command with our people yet require ridiculous levels of oversight of minutiae - vide 1* approval for biscuits at a meeting.
I could go on. I understand that we need to be lean and cut down on waste, but I think of what costs in my time I incur doing, in effect, other peoples' jobs. ANd then multiply it by X number of personnel in my situation, who are obliged to self-administer, in spite of a system that is to provide support.
Give our people the tools, I suppose, is the strap-line.
