The MoD Has A Long History Of Wasting Taxpayers' Money

The Public Accounts Committee of the House of Commons is the oldest and most prestigious of the many select committees.

- Sean O'grady

It can trace its lineage back to 1862 and was the brainchild of WE Gladstone. The Grand Old Man of British politics bequeathed a grand old committee, whose close work with the National Audit Office and formidable reputation have exposed official idiocy and waste of all kinds.

Unfortunately, one of the most frequent subjects of the PAC’s attentions had been incompetence by the Ministry of Defence in its procurement programmes. The latest PAC report is as damning as any in its verdict on recent activities by the MoD, most notably the failure after almost two decades and some £5.5bn to develop and deploy a new “family” of light-armoured vehicles and smaller tanks, latterly known as the Ajax programme. Despite all the delays and all the resources devoted to it, not a single vehicle has been put into continuous service, and there is no date for when this might even happen.