Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, when his Department will publish the Type 45 Destroyer - Independent Power and Propulsion System Performance Review.

The decision to procure the Rolls Royce WR21 was taken in November 2000 by the then Defence Secretary, Geoff Hoon. In announcing the decision, he accepted this decision “presents a greater degree of risk to the programme.” It was judged that these risks would be outweighed by the system’s long term benefits of greater operational flexibility, as well as long-term savings in maintenance and personnel costs and a lower environmental impact.

As the issues now being addressed result from those earlier decisions, it is appropriate that liability for funding this work now rests with the Ministry of Defence. In terms of the contractual position, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Kirsten Oswald) on 8 February 2016 to Question 25239.

On progress in implementing measures to improve the reliability and resilience of the Power and Propulsion (P&P) system, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman) on 8 February 2016 to Question 25165.. The work to date has been carried out under the Type 45 support contract and the associated costs cannot be separately identified.

A copy of the Independent P&P System Performance Review, dated March 2011, redacted in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, was placed in the Library of the House on 13 May 2016.