HH,
It is thinking like that which has brought us to the current debacle. The days of surrendering the cheque book to the contractors, dropping your trousers and bending over were supposed to have ended some years ago. A significant proportion of the overruns are usually attributable to changes to the specification, which is totally down to the customer. And contracts dont have to be open ended / "cost plus". Look at the losses Boeing has to eat from time to time....
As for fewer major programmes, I find that hard to imagine given how few there are already. They could probably be counted on one hand, and yet according to the PAC, MoD forgot to include the type 31e frigates. Incredible.
Whilst I would be reluctant to take any comparison with Nissan or M&S too far, heads would have rolled in these organisations for incompetence at a much lower level than this.