TEEEJ - Thanks for that - I had assumed these were updated original airframes, not new ones. However the principle still applies. You can buy a brand new Royal Enfield motorcycle straight off the production line in India, but it's still basically 1950s technology. Same with these, looking at the interior shots they are hardly fly by wire!
Going back to the current wave of flights, I understand they are coming down the West coast of Ireland, which is, of course, a neutral country. During WW2 the Irish created a corridor to allow Coastal Command aircraft to cut off the "top bit" when transiting from N.I. bases to the patrols in the Atlantic, one of the few concessions the de Valera government made to the UK in what was euphemistically called "The Emergency". I cant imagine Ireland would compromise its neutrality to do something similar now, unless things hotted up, so its "the long way around" from Coningsby for the time being.