Yes - instead of keeping military SAR, which no-one ever put a cost on but should have to keep within the terms of a PFI - how else can you show value for money, the taxpayer is going to pay £5 Bn (it doesn't sound much when you say it fast) for less cover (12 hour cover at 3 flights instead of 1) and then have to pay even more to regain the lost ground and re-establish 24 cover.
In many other areas of business this would be called dishonest and fraudulent but somehow this PFI seems exempt.
Strange how none of the subject matter experts are involved with the final decision (which keeps being delayed) yet the IPT heirarchy, who are noticeably biased towards one bidder, are able to decide the winner and loser in this contest - it hardly seems fair and transparent. There is supposed to be a financial robustness about the winning bid but apparently one bidder has not much more than half the financing required.,....
Is the result of this expensive and time consuming process simply going to be a shoe-in for the IPT's favourite or will there actually be some scrutiny applied at some stage?