How putting a ‘mil spec’ badge on a commercial aircraft can vastly inflate its value.
In light of the fact that Boris Johnson has announced that the Government would be repainting the RAF‘s Voyager aircraft in the Union Jack colours, I’m reminded of my story that we broke about those aircraft 8 years ago on Newsnight.
I was given a document proving that the RAF had paid perhaps 18 times more than it should have for these aircraft. These Voyagers are basically A330s without any seats and fitted out with refuelling pods and some guidance equipment to help refuel jets in mid flight. Instead of buying these aircraft outright they are leased courtesy of an ill-advised PFI contract agreed by the previous Government at a vastly inflated cost to taxpayers.
See the story here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18020809
The interesting aspect of the story is not just the journalism aspect and how I got my hands on unpublished documents proving the list price for a similar aircraft from Airbus was far less than £55m each, but rather the reaction of the RAF afterwards.
After we broke the story that the MOD had signed a contract worth £10Billion for 14 Voyagers (£714m each), the then Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond, invited me and my Newsnight colleague Meirion Jones, to visit him at the MOD.
That in itself was a very big deal. Normally ministers deny the original journalism and shrug it off.
Philip Hammond genuinely wanted to find out how the MOD had paid so much more for the aircraft than they should have.
He gave me and Meirion an hour of his time in his Whitehall office. Waiting outside wearing their full colours and regalia was a clutch of RAF generals and air marshals. I can't remember the names nor ranks - just that they were much better dressed than us.
After we had gone through our documentary proof showing the waste of money at the MOD, the Secretary of State invited the uniforms into the room.
In comparison to Mr Hammond, the blazers and top brass couldn’t have been any more condescending. They refused to accept our evidence and blithely dismissed all of it because we didn’t understand “mil spec“.
Apparently it makes perfect sense to spend 15 to 20 times more for the same device if it is designated ‘military specification’. They showed us a list of some of the devices used very briefly - I wasn't allowed to make a copy or even hold the document. I caught a glimpse, though, of a switch costing £70 each. This was no high tech switch using new and advanced patented technology, this was the metal thing that you’d flick up or down depending on where it was positioned in the cockpit.
‘Mil Spec Mr Lynam’, went the refrain. He left out the implied words: ‘You wouldn't understand.’
It didn’t make any difference anyway because the MOD had locked in the government into a 27 year contract with a private company. There was no way that the Airbus company would let them out of it since it was easily the most lucrative contract they had sold in recent history. Why else would a Franco-German dominated company not be able to sell the same aircraft in France or Germany? But it found a willing buyer in Britain where the wings were made.
So now they will be repainted from ‘mil spec’ grey to Global Britain red, white and blue. I wonder whether Airbus might bid for that painting contract too.
