airframes that were deemed B.E.R.
If anyone is actively investigating this aspect, may I suggest you seek out DGDQA Standing Instruction 0136 and DEFCON 112(Repair), or any replacement standards. Were they called up in the contract?
Who set the BER rate? There is only one person with that authority. The project manager in the Glider project team. At a stretch, you could say his boss could overrule, but in all my years I've never known it. Anyone with this authority is required to be experienced in Depth C repair, to component level, of the item under consideration, or something very similar. That means, fitter, diag, supervisor and QC, at least. He must also have a detailed understanding of the costs involved as he must make a written declaration that they are "fair and reasonable" or "excessive". To make a false declaration is to commit fraud by misrepresentation.
An example. When setting the BER rate, is it 30% of the cost of a new glider on a one-off basis, or 70% of a new glider based on a production run of 50? SI 0136 details the authority of the PM to set this rate, and his signature constitutes a contract amendment and is immediately binding - which MoD commercial people are taught cannot happen. (Which is why they hate applying the correct contract conditions, effectively throwing blank cheques at contractors).
A lot falls out of this one simple statement.