HL Deb 10 February 2003 vol 644 cc77-8WA
Lord Hogg of Cumbernauld

asked Her Majesty's Government:

What progress has been made on the Watchkeeper project on the unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicle. [H L1583]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Bach)

The new chapter to the Strategic Defence Review set out the potential for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) significantly to improve operational effectiveness. UAVs will be a key contributor to network enabled capability and their ability to provide persistent surveillance of the battlefield or theatre of operations, without putting aircrew lives at risk has been demonstrated recently by the US in Afghanistan.

The central element of the UK's current plans for acquiring UAVs is the Watchkeeper programme, which will provide UK commanders with accurate, timely and high quality imagery. Watchkeeper will be an advanced system integrating air vehicles, sensor payloads and ground control facilities. It will be joined to the wider command and control network through communication systems such as Bowman, allowing information to be passed quickly. providing commanders with an improved understanding of the battle space and ensuring that military effect can more rapidly be brought to bear.

Four companies were invited to undertake the first stage of the assessment phase and to propose tenders for the second stage. All four submitted strong bids that demonstrated a good understanding of the programme requirements, the technical complexities and the project management requirements. Following detailed consideration of the proposals, on the basis of value for money and demonstration of the potential to deliver the best capability, we have today selected Northrop Grumman ISS International and Thales UK to take forward the remainder of the assessment phase. The Northrup Grumman team includes I3AE Systems, Detica Limited, General Dynamics UK Limited, STAYSYS Limited and Ultra Electronics Limited. Thales (UK)'s team includes. Aerosystems International, Elbit Systems Limited and QinetiQ.

Both selected bidders have indicated that they intend to complete the bulk of work in the UK, although it is too early at this stage to be precise regarding the full extent of the industrial benefits to the UK. These will be explored further in the remainder of the assessment phase, which will culminate by mid-2004 in the selection of a single successful contractor for the demonstration and manufacture phase. As stated in the SDR New Chapter, we remain committed to accelerating the Watchkeeper programe and an initial capability is planned for early 2006.

The Watchkeeper programme will be complemented by our plans to establish in 2003 a joint service UAV experimentation programme (JUEP). The JUEP will examine the potential of UAVs beyond the bounds of the Watchkeeper programme by enabling personnel of all three services to gain experience of exploiting different UAV systems with different payloads and configurations in a range of conditions.