" Which brings us back to "whose ends" are best served by fraudulent cost estimates? "
" 12 Million+ manhours is simply not credible. Someone somewhere is making it up. Endex."
NaB, I have to take issue with those. As I am sure you're aware, there is no such thing as an accurate estimate. Estimates are, well, estimates. The credibility or otherwise is entirely due to the quality of the data, assumptions and risks used in whichever methodology is used to derive the estimate. The team doing the QEC costings sit just down the floorplate from me and I know that they take great care to produce rigorous outputs. The amount of scrutiny that is applied these days ensures that.
The use to which the estimates are put following delivery to the customer is another thing entirely. Lies, damn lies and statistics come to mind.
P.S Cost of Capital Charge under RAB was removed from April 2010