§ Dr. WrightTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence on which occasions since 1979 his Department has employed the services of external consultants; and if he will give details of the purposes for which they were employed and the cost of employing them.
§ Mr. AitkenThe Department's central contracts branch has placed in excess of 500 contracts with consultants in each of the last few years. In addition to this figure, consultancy contracts are placed as part of specific projects and as low value orders of under £10,000. Under the Department's arrangements for the delegation of contractual authority, such contracts are placed without reference to the central contracts branch and so cannot be identified separately.
In view of this and the large number of centrally placed contracts involved over the last 15 years, an answer to this question could be provided only at disproportionate cost and effort.