According to JDW (18 Sept) Philip Dunne said at DSEI that a split buy of F-35B and F-35A was no longer being considered for the RAF/RN. "....very agonising decisions on which variant to buy (when B was briefly dropped in favour of C), and we have no intentions of reopening those discussions (wrt B and A)" This is at variance with what Hammond has said stating that a number of F-35As may be procured to offset the cut in numbers of B to 48.