Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 2 March 2020 to Question 18617 on Type 23 Frigates, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of that data being held centrally.

With regard to the cost of the Type 23 programme, this draws together a number of capability enhancement programmes which are both platform specific and delivered across the entire surface fleet. Each programme is scrutinised and continually reviewed to ensure best value for money, and that the programme delivers the right outputs for Defence, as such there is no requirement to hold this information centrally.