The £15 million savings will be/are already being made by getting rid of the sacrificial helo's. Remember though that the original savings figure was 22%. This, I believe is now down to 11%. Although some 'regions' are declaring better than 11%.
Further savings can be made by making most (90%) of all the pilots: DE (In my opinion).
Further savings by stopping units 'loitering' after a job and trying to be pro-active. In airframe hours and fuel.
Long term savings: get rid of different airframes. They should all be EC135's with the exception of MPS. FW for Dyfed Powys - don't make me laugh
My post #23 is answered by Silsoesid's latest re the additional funding which is absolutely essential if NPAS is to be taken seriously for the following reasons:
They need money to pay their overheads.
They need money to pay those units back for relinquishing their a/c to NPAS.
They need money to pay for their new AOC.
They need money to pay for their offices (whenever that is decided and W yorks are STILL deliberating as to whether they want the job of running NPAS!!).
This latest cash injection is a positive signal from the H.O. that this project will not fail. AND it answers a lot of police authorities concerns that there is no future funding plan by the NPAS. This will persuade most, now, to join.
So watch out for the following:
Statement on delaying the start of NPAS.
Who the new 'parent' of NPAS is (W Yorks / MPA / Kent)
Who will replace NPIA.
But I agree - this latest cash injection makes a mockery of the original cash cutbacks they were trying to achieve. I would love to see how far out they have projected to start actually clawing back their money. It must be close to 10+yrs now.