Sounds like the impending pain is reserved for the MOD, civilians and supporting elements.
A bit of a pity, as some of these elements do a great job that will not be apparent on a balance sheet.
A further pity if large swathes of the flying prevention branch are left untouched purely because they wear a uniform.
Developments in the military over recent years have mirrored the government. We now have 'large government' in the form of bloated HQ's adding numerous extra layers of bureaucracy.
Many of the personnel working in these HQ's are decent people, they would just be better employed out in the real world, rather than bunkered up in some HQ.
I offer JHC as an example. How many pilots are employed there?
Let's thin out the HQ's a bit, making them flatter and leaner, release more people do actually do the job we trained them to do, whilst removing the suffocating levels of bureaucracy and micromanagement that are currently dragging us down.