Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what estimate his Department has made of the whole life cost of the UK's current group of (a) CDEL and (b) RDEL E-7 Wedgetail aircraft.

The 2021 Government Major Projects Portfolio (GMPP) data set records a cost of £2.2 billion for a baseline fleet of five aircraft. However, this figure is for the acquisition programme and does not include sustainment costs (the Project End date on GMPP is 30 Jun 2026).

The 2021 Integrated Review announced a reduction in fleet size to three aircraft and announced that they would be based at RAF Lossiemouth. This change will make a significant reduction in the programme's Whole Life Cost, and an updated estimate will be made ahead of the next formal business case submission, estimated in 2022.

The total cost to date (as of June 2021) for the E-7 Wedgetail acquisition are as follows: (a) CDEL: £775.62 million and (b) RDEL: £33.05 million.