Defence funding - A perfect storm

The newshounds who make up Computing’s readership will have noticed that there’s a debate about defence funding going on at a fairly high volume. A perfect storm has been generated in defence, where a combination of wartime commitments, wear and tear, and the need to modernize defence capability has led to the most pressured budget round in a generation.

Publicly, this is increasingly starting to look like a bunfight between the Ministry of Defence and everyone’s favourite villain, the Treasury. In the red corner is the Treasury, who delivered a worse than inflation budget settlement for defence as part of efforts to keep public spending down.
In the blue corner there’s the Ministry of Defence, which is facing an ill-timed and emotionally resonant mismatch of workload and resources. Timing is playing a part – the current budget crunch comes at a critical time in the MoD’s attempts to replace Cold War kit and use more technology to support troops.

In a timely illustration of what Defence chiefs are trying to achieve, in the last couple of days millions of British viewers have watched coverage of Prince Harry deployed in Afghanistan. The footage following his day to day work has shown how he has used advanced information and communications technology to co-ordinate the actions of troops, UAVs, fighter jets and special forces.

The latest round of Army recruitment adverts are also being aired, and show how even the most fundamental aspects of the military’s work are being revolutionized by the use of technology. In the most recent, an Army foot patrol in unfamiliar territory is kept safe by a robot spy plane, which lets the base keep an eye out for potential explosive devices left in the troops’ path.

The recruiting ad makes great play out of the fact that this plane is being piloted from the base by a young looking guy with an Xbox controller, and in reality it is an excellent way of illustrating how pervasive all sorts of technology is becoming in defence. The benefits from using technology developed for sectors like gaming may be substantial, and as the MoD continues to open the market to new and smaller companies there’s every potential that more of this kind of truly game-changing innovation will be able to be brought into service.

Unfortunately, this isn’t an easy time to be trying to change the way things are done. Under the political spotlight, with two ongoing campaigns, the need to protect troops in theatre and huge amounts of wear and tear, the MoD is having to bend over backwards to keep funding and efforts for the modernization progress going. Ironically, in the long run the implementation of better technology will generate the efficiencies which will help lower costs and reduce pressures on the budget – delivering more for less.

Intellect is working to support these efforts, and like everyone else in the defence community we believe the MoD’s first priority is to protect troops. Clearly, the adoption of cutting edge military tech is now going a long way towards keeping soldiers, sailors, and airmen safe and helping them do their jobs. Given, though, that it doesn't look like there's any more help coming from the red corner, it looks as though the blues will be struggling to get back on their feet for a while yet.

By Joel Grundy, Programme Manager