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The cost of new armed drones for the UK military has jumped more than 40 per cent in part due to attempts by the Ministry of Defence to find savings in its budget two years ago.
The price tag to buy and operate a fleet of 16 US-made Protector pilotless aircraft has risen to £1.76bn, up from a 2016 estimated total lifetime cost of £1.25bn, according to official figures.
The extra costs of the programme were revealed in a series of ministerial answers to written parliamentary questions presented by the opposition Labour party over recent months.
A decision by the MoD in 2021 to delay the programme by two years, which allowed the department to claim unspecified in-year savings, added £187mn to the overall cost, according to the documents.
Other issues that raised the cost included a late alteration to the specifications of the drone that involved changing its primary sensor to avoid future obsolescence.
The drone is made by General Atomics of the US and has a wingspan of 24 metres, which is bigger than most business jets. It is packed with sensors used for surveillance and targeting and armed with 500lb laser-guided bombs and air-to-ground missiles capable of hitting fast-moving vehicles.
Protector was originally expected to enter service towards the end of the past decade but has suffered several delays. It is now due to enter service late next year but ministers have yet to confirm when it will be declared fully operational.
It will replace the Reaper drones in service with the Royal Air Force which have been involved in controversial targeted strikes in Syria, including the killing of a British jihadi in 2015.
As a result of the delay, the MoD is extending the lifetime of the existing Reaper system at a cost of £49mn, which the government said it was offsetting through funding previously allocated to the Protector programme.
The MoD’s latest assessment of its big projects has given the programme an “amber” confidence rating and warned that it still faces “significant challenges”.
Labour shadow defence secretary John Healey said the rising cost of Predator was an example of the MoD’s “broken” procurement system and wasteful attitude to taxpayers’ money.
Conservative MP and former defence minister Mark Francois, who sits on the Commons defence select committee, said the Protector was “yet another in a long litany of MoD procurement programmes that have performed very poorly in keeping to time and cost”.
It follows severe problems with the £5.5bn Ajax armoured vehicle and the £3.2bn Morpheus battlefield communications system.
Francois called on Grant Shapps, who was appointed defence secretary last month, to consider “wholesale reform” to the way the ministry acquires new systems.
Francis Tusa, editor of the Defence Analysis newsletter, said Protector was “a pretty inglorious programme”, adding: “If you change the specifications once you’ve signed the contract the costs are only going to go one way — up.”
The war in Ukraine, Tusa added, had shown that drones needed to be disposable. With the “system costing tens of millions of pounds a pop, is this a price you want to pay?” he asked.
The MoD said: “All procurement decisions are made with best value for the taxpayer in mind. The MoD upgraded Protector’s primary sensor, enhancing its battlefield capabilities beyond what was originally planned which contributed to an increase to the original programme cost.”
General Atomics did not respond to requests for comment.
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