Even senior insiders are in the dark on this one.
My best hunch for what it's worth:
The mil were expected to pay for 2/3rds of this. Now they are gone. Can MCA be expected to front up the whole amount, especially after they have just undegone a massive SDR of their own? Of course not. Where will the government go for the remainder?
Consequently I suspect Soteria are uneasy with the contract now and worried that IF they sign on the dotted line after confirmation the mil are history, then somewhere down the line they may be expected to carry more of the financial load...and this wasn't part of the deal.
The MCA are a shadow of their former selves after these savage cuts in their inventory - does anyone honestly feel they are capable of running an alien concept such as SAR-H before their cuts never mind after them? It requires specialist aviators to run a SAR outfit and the coastguard for all their expertise have zero, nil, nada aviation experience in the UK. They leave it to the helicopter companies themselves.
Soteria are going to have to renegotiate the contract, which means they are caught between a rock and a hard place. Sign up and be damned. Argue over the changes and the competition will return for seconds! There will be no prisoners
The government have just shot themselves in the foot with this.......