While Jim’s scenario is of course correct, what is of real concern here is these committees choose to ignore solid evidence of senior officers and politicians condoning deliberate waste.
The subject here is aviation stores. Pre-June 1987 it was policy to have Max/Min stock levels, the ideal being a stores demand was satisfied in accordance with the FUD system. (i.e. priority 02-04 in 48 hours, or whatever).
Then, in 1987, AMSO (it’s ok, he doesn’t seem to post here anymore after the Mull of Kintyre evidence revealed what I’m about to say) formulated a policy whereby perfectly serviceable stores were scrapped; the effect being the FUD system collapsed. By definition, as a matter of policy the Repair Turn Round Time now included the manufacturing lead time of the spares required.
Then, in April 1990, one of his successors introduced what was colloquially known as the “Not in Time” policy, whereby the above policy was extended to routine Unit demands (as opposed to those required to effect 3-4th line repairs). Contracts to replace consumed spares where not initiated until there were outstanding demands. Similarly, by definition your demand was outstanding for at least the Admin and Production lead time.
To be fair, this policy was amended to “Just in Time”, which at least acknowledged demands should be met in a reasonable timescale. (Just in Time is, rightly, much maligned, but very few realise it was actually an attempt at improving the situation brought about by AMSO). However, as the funding baseline was “Not in Time”, the money had to be found from somewhere to re-stock the shelves. The “solution” was to reclassify Repairable kit (especially avionics) as Consumable, thus avoiding the cost of repairs (which simply hid the problem for a few months, until the incumbents moved on). Also, War Reserves were scrapped (just as we were undergoing TTW for GW1). The significant funding pot that was robbed to pay for this was the airworthiness one. We know what that caused, which is the best indication of the long term effects of AMSO’s policy.
Despite having all this evidence in front of them for the past umpteen years, no committee has ever mentioned it. Why? Always ask who is protected by this not being revealed. The answer is – those who sign off the reports in MoD, and their VSO predecessors/mentors.
Last edited by tucumseh; 3rd Aug 2012 at 05:18.