I dispair when see the all the arrmed forces taking cuts of this type and with the security situation at the moment it seems a little foolish of the goverment to say the least.
But having been quite close to the forces of late I have to ask how much money is being squandered by the over the top health and safety requirments , people "over specifing" contracts way beond what would be excepted in the commercial world just to ensure that there is not even the remotest chance of any "come back" on them self's if something should go wrong and just good old fashoned lack of commercial nouse ?.
I know of a number of inccidents but I would not like to make them public for fear of the damaging effect that it might have on my contacts.
This all leads me to think that what is needed is the employment of a "station money saver" pay would only be a percentage of money saved and with a very strict rule that the "sharp end" of the forces should be enhanced by these efforts not suffer because of them and so the efforts should be strictly commercial with the military checking the results , the civil service should NOT be involved as they at the root of most of the day to day waste.
I feel that a lot of people in the defence contract and health & safety industrys may well have a lot to answer for having gold plated contracts over the years.