The background
As part of the government’s comprehensive spending review, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) is facing cuts of 10-20 per cent in its annual £37bn budget.
One of the thorniest issues is the Trident nuclear deterrent, made up of four submarines based on the Clyde, which can deploy ballistic missiles carrying nuclear warheads.
The coalition government – despite Liberal Democrat opposition before the election – is committed to replacing this.
The Treasury has made it clear that the £20bn cost of this replacement will have to be borne by the MoD, as the department carries out its strategic defence and security review.
Ministers have been working to a timetable that assumes a final decision (known as the main gate decision) on a replacement would be made by 2014.
Sections of the media, including Channel 4 News, were told this week that ministers were considering a delay to save money in the short term.
Reports of a delay led to uproar in the Commons today and a subsequent denial from Armed Forces Minister Nick Harvey that this was being considered.
He said: “There is no suggestion that I’m aware of either delaying any decision or indeed delaying the procurement …. the key decisions and the timetable are already decided and nothing has changed that in any sense.”
The former defence secretary Bob Ainsworth was suspicious, telling the House that “somebody high up in the government is casting the bread on the water and is thinking about delaying the replacement in the way that is being reported”.
For the Conservatives, a delay would lead to claims that they had broken their election pledge on Trident. For the cash-strapped MoD, it could add to the long-term costs.
The analysis
Malcolm Chalmers, who advised Mr Ainsworth when he was in government and now works at the Royal United Services Institute, believes the size of any extra costs would depend on the length of any delay.
He told Channel 4 News: “People have been talking about a main gate decision in 2014. If it becomes 2015, it’s not a big delay. If it’s 2018 or 2019, then you’re talking about something different. If it’s a five-year delay and 2020 rather than 2015, that is more substantial.”
The defence white paper, the Future of the United Kingdom’s Nuclear Deterrent, was published in December 2006.
It said the Vanguard class submarines were designed to last 25 years, but work had been undertaken to assess if their lives could be extended.
It went on to say: “Our ability to achieve this is limited because some major components on the submarines …. were only designed for a 25-year life …. we believe that, by revalidating those components, it should be possible to extend the life of the submarines by around five years.
“Any further extension of the life of the submarines would mean that the key components described previously would need to be replaced or refurbished, and this would require a major refit of the submarines. This would not extend the lives of the submarines much further and would not therefore be cost effective.”
In short, the life of the submarines could be extended to 30 years, but no further on cost effectiveness grounds. And yet an extension is an idea that has been floated this week.
Now to costs. In its report on the white paper publised in March 2007, the all-party defence select committee said it had been given costings by senior MoD civil servant Tom McKane.
“… he stated that ‘the work that we have done shows that we are probably talking in round terms of hundreds of millions for the five years for the four boats’. Mr McKane told us that with life extension beyond 30 years ‘you then start talking in terms of billions’.”
In other words, delay could be costly in the long term.
The conclusion
Having to make a decision about Trident’s replacement in this age of austerity is the last thing the government needs at the moment, but that is what it must do. The four submarines will not last forever and as far as the Prime Minister is concerned, a nuclear deterrent is integral to Britain’s defence.
In its defence white paper, the Future of the United Kingdom’s Nuclear Deterrent, the Labour government made it clear that extending the life of the submarines beyond 30 years would not be cost effective.
The senior MoD civil servant, Tom McKane, told the defence select committee it would cost “hundreds of millions” to extend from 25 to 30 years, and “billions” beyond that.
After today’s announcement from the armed forces minister – that a delay is not being considered – we can assume that these arguments are now being taken to heart.
