Interesting set of responses. The view I took at MOD(PE) was that, for better or worse, this was the aeroplane that had been ordered and we had to make the best of it. It was quite frustrating that many people in the RAF were willing to judge it on all sorts of potential issues before it had even been delivered, but life is often like that. The fact that it was 2 years late was a simple effect of the mods that were applied to the original Embraer design to meet the ever changing and optimistic specification - engine, canopy, ejection seat, oxygen system, fatigue life requirements, ADR, cockpit layout, etc - it was a major modification to the original and so the delay was hardly surprising. NB I think that Embraer only built the first 2 or 4 fuselages, not 10.
There was also the idea of "Best and Final Offer" whereby each consortium was asked for their BAFO in turn, several times! Politicians had the idea that that you would get a lower cost whilst still getting the same end result, which is just not true. Of course, a company will cut corners as they trim their costs. I'm sure the PC9 family would have been a better aircraft for the RAF, but they (Michael Heseltine) had let politics and finances get in the way. I think the RAF (eventually) had a good aeroplane that, for the cost, had a very successful career.