Serious questions have again been raised over whether the British Army's fleet of Ajax armoured vehicles will ever be fit for combat. About 6.3 billion pounds has been spent on the programme since 2017, yet the vehicles are still not in operation. The concerns have been set out by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, which scrutinises government spending.
The Ajax has become one of the Army's most controversial programmes, and the delays come down to two main problems. The first is that the vehicles make so much noise and vibrate so much when they move that soldiers riding in them have suffered hearing problems and sickness.
The second issue arises when the vehicles stop. According to the findings, once an Ajax halts it then needs to be checked to make sure it can safely proceed forward again, adding another obstacle to getting the fleet into service.
The Public Accounts Committee said the Ministry of Defence has a responsibility to set out how long it will take to bring the vehicles into operation. The committee stressed that taxpayers and the armed forces need clarity on a programme that has already absorbed billions of pounds.
The committee's chair, Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, was damning in his assessment. He said armoured vehicles which injure soldiers when they are operated outside rigid parameters will be of little use on the modern battlefield. The vehicles remain in trials, are not being used in combat, and on current form may never be.
The criticism lands amid wider uncertainty over the Government's defence investment plan, which sets out how much money will be spent on the armed forces. The plan was supposed to be published last autumn, but it is now expected next month, a delay the committee described as bureaucratic drift that is embarrassing in the eyes of both the UK's allies and its enemies.
The Ministry of Defence said it is working on the plan and that it should be published before the NATO summit in July in Turkey. The Ajax questions came on the same day the Prime Minister was due to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, along with his French and German counterparts, to discuss the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.