Campaign to oppose a privatised military academy for St Athan - biggest PFI/PPP ever, with arms dealers Raytheon Serco. John Pilger "a British "School of the Americas" is to be built in Wales, where British soldiers will train killers from all corners of the American empire in the name of "global security". Tony Benn “The thought of privatising the training for the Armed forces was morally abominable”
Showing posts with label Charles Barrington. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Charles Barrington. Show all posts
Peter Collins article ‘It’s business as usual’ for the academy is so misleading and unbalanced - Metrix talk of partnerships with WAG who seem to be happy to continue with this unfeasible fantasy which is unpopular with the military top brass and even more unpopular with PCS the union representing the skilled workforce involved. How can boss Barrington from Metrix claim that privatised training is more efficient or cost effective when they are cutting courses by 25% jeopardising effectiveness or in plain English - putting our soldiers at risk-as a desperate measure to reduce costs already £2 BILLION over budget. Rumour is that Qinetiq and Raytheon don't seem to see eye to eye which doesn't bode well for training delivery. Qinetiq shares have dropped because of the likelihood of a collapse of the (DTR) St Athan project. We must not forget there have been protests worldwide against Raytheon weapon suppliers, there is a massive protest now in Bristol however it is very likely that permanent protest will be coming to St Athan with Raytheon.
Staff affected by the Defence Training Review recently found out from an article in the Financial Times that:
Charles Barrington, chairman of Metrix, told the Financial Times that the turmoil in the credit markets had forced the consortium to abandon its original plan to raise up to £1bn through a bond issue.
“The bond market is not conducive at the moment so we are looking at a bank solution,” he said.
The project had, however, already secured the support of a group of banks in principle, he stressed.
A final decision on which funding route to go down would not be made until the programme was closer to completion.
Mr Barrington expected the MoD to give its final sign-off on a full investment decision early next year, later than originally expected.
By Sylvia Pfeifer, Defence Industries Correspondent
Published: August 29 2008 03:00 | Last updated: August 29 2008 03:00
Fresh concerns have been raised over an £11bn training programme for the military - one of the government's largest private finance initiatives - after the fall-out from the credit crunch raised its cost by nearly 10 per cent in less than 20 months.
The Defence Training Review (DTR) will centralise all non-military technical training for army, navy and air force personnel in one academy, at St Athan in the Vale of Glamorgan.
The first part of DTR, a 30-year PFI programme to train military engineers, was awarded to a consortium called Metrix, led by Qinetiq, the defence research group, in January 2007.
But the economic downturn has contributed towards increasing the cost of the programme to £12bn. The Ministry of Defence said the increase "is due to the impact of inflation and borrowing costs and the current economic climate, not just directly associated with cost growth".
Separately, Charles Barrington, chairman of Metrix, told the Financial Times that the turmoil in the credit markets had forced the consortium to abandon its original plan to raise up to £1bn through a bond issue.
"The bond market is not conducive at the moment so we are looking at a bank solution," he said.
The project had, however, already secured the support of a group of banks in principle, he stressed.
A final decision on which funding route to go down would not be made until the programme was closer to completion.
Mr Barrington expected the MoD to give its final sign-off on a full investment decision early next year, later than originally expected.
Concerns about the affordability of the programme, given the MoD's severe budget crisis, persist. Last month Bob Ainsworth, armed forces minister, admitted to MPs that "this is taking longer than is ideal". He added that "financial appraisals have thrown up some difficult issues".
Mr Barrington said Metrix was working hard to give the MoD "a project that will meet its affordability gap under its constrained circumstances".
"The MoD is operating not only in an operational environment it has not seen for a generation, but also operating in a budgetary environment that it has not seen for a generation," he said.
There was no indication the programme would not happen. "This is a nationally important project. You only need to consider the value of trained personnel to the current operational army to realise how important technical training is."
The programme has proved highly political since its inception. The competition pitted Wales against the West Midlands to secure the main base for the contract. A bid from a rival consortium would have based its training at RAF Cosford and some of its personnel will now have to move to Wales.
The consortium received a pre-contract award of £9.5m from the MoD in the spring, which is being used to develop a transition plan and start work transforming the training courses.
At any one time, some 6,000 students are going through training and around 1,100 courses are taught every year. There are currently nine different training sites.
Public consultation for the planning process started a few weeks ago. Construction at the site is due to begin in 2009 and be completed in 2013.
In Planet magazine there is an email exchange between Stephen Thomas (Director of the Welsh Centre for International Affairs) and Sara Koopman, an academic who is an activist with the School of the Americas Watch, they exchange their experiences of campaigning against St Athan and School of the Amer...icas.
Campaign Objections to defence technical college here
State underwrites UK defence’s PFI project By Alex Barker, Political Correspondent
Published: February 25 2009 02:19 | Last updated: February 25 2009 02:19
Ministers have quietly offered contractors bigger state guarantees as a means of rescuing the £12bn ($17bn) private finance project to centralise the military’s training, the Financial Times has learnt.
See OU society matters article here Metrix shambles and OU here Should the OU be involved in the ARMS TRADE? here OU OU partnerships with armed forces? here Daily Mail - controversial £11bn contract to provide training to
Britain's armed forces is in danger of collapsing as a result of the credit crunch.herePlaid chief opposes St Athan Academy 6-Sep-08 hereWales must not be a cog in the war machine - Daily Post..here‘St Athan jobs dwindle while the costs rise’ here
Meet the mystery defense contractors that are raking in billions in taxpayer dollars without notice. Read more » "We recommend that people throughout the world launch nonviolent actions against US and UK corporations that directly profit from this war” - 7th Recommendation of the World Tribunal on Iraq, June 2005; http://www.worldtribunal.org/
What are the 'benefits' to the MOD of transferring risk to the private sector?
Derek Twigg MP, Under Secretary of State for Defence, talks to PSCA International's Matthew D'Arcy about what lies ahead in bringing a new flexible approach to learning through the Defence Training Review. “Partnership with the private sector does give us flexibility, and this is the key point here, to decrease or increase student throughput. The partner will be able to generate third party income from spare capacity and also dispose of surplus capacity. It also allows for a very important part of the role for industry to bring private sector management expertise and the ability to include significant capital investment at this stage. It is really about delivering a modern and flexible learning environment that will be fit for our service personnel of the future.” Facilities key to defence trainingThe PPP Journal Issue 56 - Thursday, April 12, 2007
Raytheon News
Raytheon Raytheon Tucson is a pretty awful place to work. If you're thinking about working there, you should think long and hard before you accept the offer. ... Raytheon Says 12 Private Wells Are Polluted Raytheon: Plume Is No ThreatTampa Tribune - USA.. environmental experts from Raytheon told a crowd of about 700 people in St. Petersburg on Friday that a toxic plume of chemicals that ...
Rhodri Morgan should be ashamed of himself for supporting raytheon with no supporting evidence
Ending Contractor Impunity see here The Center for Public Integrity, The Windfalls of War. Global Policy Forum. “State Sovereignty and Private Security Companies” webpage with documents, analyses, articles and links. Available here Human Rights Watch, Private Military Contractors and the Law. See here International Committee of the Red Cross, Privatisation of War section. See here Private Military Companies. See here War on Want, Getting Away with Murder. See here Sourcewatch. See here
News: Officials: Hundreds of Iraqis Killed By Faulty Grenades ..failure rates as high as 40 percent. Hundreds and possibly thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed or maimed by outdated, defective U.S. cluster weapons that lack a safety feature other countries have added, according to observers, news reports and officials……… Britain, which joined the USA in the fight to oust Saddam Hussein, fired 2,000 artillery cluster weapons in the war. All were equipped with Israeli-made grenades with secondary fuses and a 2 percent dud rate, the British Defense Ministry said…….."The funding for R and D [research and development] in the Army was minimal, and fusing was the last on the list," said Bruce Mueller, a former Army lieutenant colonel who managed the fuse program for defense contractor Raytheon. "They develop weapons, then they develop munitions, and after they develop munitions, the last thing they worry about is how to fuse them."
Raytheon. The company makes the guidance systems for many of the missiles that are sold to Israel and that caused so much civilian death in the conflict, including the 51 people crushed to death in a bunker in Qana.
Download Corporate Mercenaries [pdf]: War on Want's report on PMSCs - Private Military and Security Companies - Corporate Mercenaries: The threat of private military and security companies…..Northrop Grumman and Raytheon are major arms contractors also selling PMSC services.
Clusterbombs - On April 1st an undetermined number of BLU-97/B submunitions hit Hilla, with reports claiming that at least 33 civilians were dead and around 300 injured.
America Cluster Bombs Iraq - UN Security Council - Global Policy Forum The missile is described by the Navy, its primary developer, and Raytheon Systems, its manufacturer, as a long-range glide bomb. Acting Pentagon spokesman ... www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/2001/0226cstr.htm - 14k -
Dozens of Iraqi dead after cluster bomb attack in Hilla Amnesty International has condemned the Hilla bombing and the US use of clusterbombs, saying that the use of cluster bombs against a civilian area of Hilla... www.ccmep.org/2003_articles/Iraq/040403_dozens_of_iraqi_dead_after_clust.htm - 14k -
The use of cluster bombs Human Rights Watch "U.S. Use of Clusters in Baghdad Condemned" 16 April 2003) The cluster bombs that were used in Hilla were identified by Landmine Action, ... www.informationclearinghouse.info/article3463.htm - 31k -
