Phoney Tony,
I can't quite decide whether you posted that with your tongue firmly in your cheek or whether you are serious. The RAF has a long and proud history of intelligence collection capabilities that have served us well at both the strategic and tactical levels, stretching back to the post-war period moving right the way up to current day. What you suggest would kill that capability overnight - and bearing in mind that recent ops have shown that we no longer do airpower for the sake of airpower i.e. we are usually a supporting force, I'm fairly sure that many of our 'customers' would have something to say about it.
That said, it's such a ridiculous suggestion, that it might just be a seriously considered option by some of the politicians out on the lunatic fringe.
Glad Rag ... we do / did - after the Americans of course. But the US are stopping supporting the D model which we have and are going on to the E model. This is really a non-story but the sensationalist headlines have whipped up a frenzy. Given that the UK has limited organic capabilties to support AND develop the Apache moving forward, there are 3 options. 1. we can either keep the Ds going at best endeavours until they become irrelevant and dangerous on the battlefield through their non-compatability (certainly not overnight); 2. we can develop our own industrial base to try and upgrade over the years (I suggest would be complex) or 3. we can just upgrade to the newer E model.
Given our prowess at attempting to upgrade our own Chinooks, I suggest buying the next model will be cheaper and quicker in the long run.