Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much their Department spent on hospitality in (a) 2021, (b) 2022 and (c) 2023.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The figures provided for Entertainment and Hospitality for financial year (FY) 2021 to FY 2023 are as follows. FY2023-24’s figures will be available once the accounts have been finalised.
FY2020-21 | 1.565 million |
FY2021-22 | 2.284 million |
F20Y22-23 | 3.640 million |
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much his Department spent on taxi cabs for (a) ministers and (b) civil servants in each of the last three years.
Answered by Sarah Atherton
Departmental spend on taxi cabs for Ministers has been recorded as £92.30 for 2021 and £50.40 for 2022. There was no recorded spend for 2020.
Information regarding spend on taxi cabs for civil servants is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. The current civil travel expense system does not have a specific category for taxi claims and cannot be distinguished from any other mode of public transport.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much his Department spent on first class train travel for (a) ministers and (b) civil servants in (i) 2020, (i) 2021 and (iii) 2022.
Answered by Sarah Atherton
This information is not centrally held and can be provided only at disproportionate cost. Recorded costs are allocated against the unit within the civil service which booked and paid for travel, which is not necessarily the individual who travelled.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much his Department has spent on (a) agency workers and (b) agency retainer fees in (i) 2020, (ii) 2021 and (iii) 2022.
Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)
Agency workers (more commonly referred to as “Contingent Labour” or “Temporary Workers”) are subject to a Cabinet Office controls framework to ensure robust governance of spending in this area.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/contingent-labour-spend-control
The Department maintains a central record of overall expenditure on Contingent Labour and discloses this expenditure as part of our Annual Report and Accounts (ARAc) and for ease of reference the values reported in the financial years covering the requested years are as follows;
Financial Year | Value |
2021-22 | £483.318 million |
2020-21 | £418.950 million |
2019-20 | £272.385 million |
We have interpreted your reference to agency retainer fees as the fees charged at the commencement of the provision of a search recruitment service, this is only applicable when recruiting for a permanent or fixed term post.
Agency retainer fees are not applicable to the contingent labour market.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much their Department has spent on air travel for (a) Ministers and (b) officials in (i) 2020, (ii) 2021 and (iii) 2022.
Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)
This information is published every quarter and can be found at
Data for Ministry of Defence senior officials can be found at:
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much their Department has spent on advertising in (a) 2020, (b) 2021 and (c) 2022.
Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)
A full departmental response could only be provided at disproportionate cost. The amount spent by the Department on advertising that is readily available for financial years 2019-20 was £37,181,434, 2020-21 was £34,202,240 and 2022-21 was £30,898,987. The figures in this answer are provided by the Royal Navy, Army, Royal Air Force and the Directorate of Defence Communications. The majority of expenditure is accounted for by advertising of the Armed Forces to aid recruitment.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much his Department has spent on consultancy fees in (a) 2020, (b) 2021 and (c) 2022; and what the name is of each consultancy contracted.
Answered by Jeremy Quin
The Department maintains a central record of overall consultancy expenditure which is disclosed as part of the Annual Report and Accounts (ARAc). For ease of reference, the values reported for all Consultancy spend in 2020 and 2021 is shown below:
Financial Year 2020-21 £109.668 million
Financial Year 2019-20 £98.080 million
Please be aware that the UK Public Sector fiscal year runs April-March and as such, analysis is captured by financial not calendar year.
The total consultancy spend during Financial Year 2021-2022 will be reported within the MOD's 2021-22 Annual Report and Accounts which is due to be published imminently. This will be available at the link below;
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/mod-annual-reports
The following table lists the Top 10 Companies by Value of Consultancy Services provided to the MOD in 2019-20 and 2020-21:
2019-20 - TOP 10 BY CONSULTANCY VALUE | 2020-21 - TOP 10 BY CONSULTANCY VALUE | ||
1 | KPMG LLP | 1 | KPMG LLP |
2 | DELOITTE LLP | 2 | PA CONSULTING SERVICES LTD |
3 | PA CONSULTING SERVICES LTD | 3 | DELOITTE LLP |
4 | CGI IT UK LIMITED | 4 | QINETIQ LIMITED |
5 | DENTONS UKMEA LLP | 5 | DENTONS UKMEA LLP |
6 | QINETIQ LIMITED | 6 | MCKINSEY & COMPANY INC UNITED KINGDOM |
7 | MASS CONSULTANTS LIMITED | 7 | MASS CONSULTANTS LIMITED |
8 | FRAZER-NASH CONSULTANCY LIMITED | 8 | BURGES SALMON LLP |
9 | IMPROBABLE WORLDS LTD | 9 | JONES LANG LASALLE LIMITED |
10 | ERNST & YOUNG LLP | 10 | ARCADIS LLP |
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the total value has been of contracts held by their Department with (a) G4S, (b) Serco and (c) Capita in each year since 2020.
Answered by Jeremy Quin
The total value of contracts between the Ministry of Defence and G4S, Serco and Capita since 2020 is set out in the table below:
Company | 2020 (£million) | 2021 (£million) | 2022 (£million as at 06/07/22) |
G4S PLC | £0.007 | £0.038 | £5.835 |
Serco Group PLC | £890.6 | £899.5 | £804.4 |
Capita PLC | £2,023.0 | £3,355.2 | £3,299.6 |
The figures provided reflect contract end dates and use the latest current agreed value for the contract. Contract values may change throughout a contract’s life and figures may have been revised up or down from the value in previous years.
Furthermore, contracts spanning multiple years can appear in more than one year. As such, the totals for each separate year cannot be further aggregated as this would introduce double or triple counting.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much their Department and its associated agencies spent on legal disputes in (a) 2020, (b) 2021 and (c) 2022.
Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)
This information you request is not held centrally and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. However, information on legal expenses for external consultants can be found here;
https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.publishing.service.gov.uk%2Fgovernment%2Fuploads%2Fsystem%2Fuploads%2Fattachment_data%2Ffile%2F1056190%2Fdepartmental_resources_2021.ods&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK
£10 million was spent in 2021, and £9 million in 2020 but this does not cover all expenses on legal disputes.
Asked by: Jon Trickett (Labour - Hemsworth)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many contracts that are worth (a) between £1 million and £3 million and (b) over £3 million their (i) Department and (ii) Department’s agencies and non-departmental public bodies (A) have agreed since 2010 and (B) are due to agree within the next 12 months; how much their Department has spent on monitoring each contract in each year since 2010; and how many officials have been working on that monitoring in each year since 2010.
Answered by Jeremy Quin
Since 2010, the Ministry of Defence (MOD) has placed around 2,700 contracts between £1 million and £3 million and around 3,600 contracts over £3 million. These figures include Defence Equipment and Support, and the Submarine Delivery Agency.
Further information, including contracts which are due to be agreed in the next 12 months, the cost and number of officials to monitor contracts since 2010 and those held by other MOD agencies and public bodies, is not held centrally.
The MOD published its first Acquisition Pipeline on 13 June 2022, which is a forward look of future potential procurement activity. This publication can be found on GOV.UK:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mod-acquisition-pipeline.