Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what is the expected (a) procurement cost and (b) whole life cost of the Type 83 destroyer programme.

The Type 83/Future Air Dominance System programme remains in the pre-concept phase and has not yet reached the level of maturity for budget allocation. It is the intent of the Department that the programme and procurement strategy will be decided following the concept phase. The concept phase will determine the procurement and whole life costs of the programme.

Defence Equipment and Support have been allocated overall funding to develop various concepts on multiple projects. It is therefore difficult to delineate precise costs, particularly as Type 83 is pre-concept, but workforce related funding estimated to be less than £1 million has been allocated to the Type 83/FADs programme to date.