The Ministry of Defence (MOD) has provided new detail on the cost of establishing the National Armaments Director (NAD) Group, confirming £4.7 million has been spent to date and reiterating that no extra costs have been incurred from having the organisation run by an interim head rather than a permanent appointment.
In two written parliamentary questions on 24 September 2025, Conservative MP Mark Francois pressed the department on whether the use of an acting director had driven up costs, and what the total expenditure of the design phase would be.
Responding, Defence Minister Luke Pollard said “this Government is delivering the deepest defence reforms in over 50 years. On 31 March 2025 the National Armaments Director (NAD) Group was stood up – creating a new export to end acquisition system designed to cut waste and fix the broken procurement system this Government inherited.”
The NAD Group, led by interim director Andy Start, was created to overhaul acquisition and armaments management. Pollard noted that Start has carried out “all of the responsibilities the Head of the NAD Group must, regardless of the fact he is an interim appointment,” and confirmed that “the Department has incurred no additional cost as a result of operating the NAD Group under Andy Start.”
The MOD disclosed that by the end of August 2025, £4.2 million in workforce costs had been incurred, drawn from existing departmental resources rather than additional allocations. Of this figure, £3.1 million was spent on enabling workstreams and £1.1 million on organisational change. A further £0.5 million was spent on external assistance in support of the group’s establishment, bringing the total expenditure to £4.7 million.
According to Pollard, “this expenditure was drawn from existing resource within MOD, and is not a net increase for the Department.” The design phase of the NAD Group is scheduled to conclude on 31 March 2026, at which point a final costing will be confirmed.
Nearly £5 million in 6 months on workforce costs consisting of enabling workstreams, organisational change and external assistance.
Sounds like money well spent then.
yes but if you look that’s just indicative cost as all staff were drawn from existing resources.. that is code for we got a load of people and shifted them around and made them do this as well as their 3 or 4 other jobs and wonder why fu?K all has been done. It reminds me why the NHS never gets anything changed as it does this to people all the time and wonders why they become ineffective.. at one point I had no less than seven distinct jobs at the same time.
head of primary care safety
lead for quality improvement for commissioning services
Lead for GPs with special interest
professional lead for Primary Care Nursing
manager for complaints department
major incident room manager
and when covid popped up I got the lead for Public health and out break management in Primary Care
I got asked to plot my priorities and time required per week.. five pages and 76 priorities later it worked out I would need 250 hours a week to fulfil all the core priorities of each job ( including line managing 3 different teams) and no one could tell me exactly what I should put on the top or drop in the 60 hours I was working ( I was paid 37.5 and my boss was trying to get me back down to a 37.5 hour week as I was looking a bit roppy)….I also asked what my actual job title was and what my badge should say… again blank looks… There is a reason governments get sod all done.
Now get on with it! This may be the best idea in decades or just another rubber stamp in the process. We are on the verge of both aerial and land incursions, and there is little time for ponderous thinking groups, only clear direction and lubricated processes to enable vital new equipment to quickly get to units who could be facing unwelcome guests before too long.
This may sound tedious but it’s necessary and seems to me to be well thought out, logical and based on empirical knowledge. I do realise that a lot of folks are saying it’s all projects (there do seem to be a plethora), investment in industry, infrastructure and no actual ordering of anything.
But fact is in WW2 we got just got by, for a long time we survived on our own and a lot of that was down to the investment in industry and technology from 1936 onwards, shadow factories and central planning put us way ahead of Germany when it came to going on a war footing.
On the other hand the almost complete lack of standardisation of munitions and gunnery calibres between the 3 services really taxed the resources available.
They do seem to be putting all their ducks in a row before actually needing them (makes a pleasant change).
Labour may not be everyone’s cup of Tea (including me), but given their huge majority and their supporters attitudes I can understand why they are emphasising Jobs and Growth to justify expenditure. For the same reason what would have been called a “Defence Equipment Plan” is now the “Defence Investment Plan”, it’s just a political way of avoiding saying we are getting ready for an arms build up.
There are people who are convincing themselves that nothing new will be ordered, given the last 35 years of cuts and more cuts I can understand that, it’s almost ingrained for us to expect little or anything positive at all. I think some are not looking at the “foundations first” strategy and thinking about what happens if they then don’t actually order anything new ! Everyone will hammer them for wasting money, leaving us defenceless and they will quite rightly look Bloody Stupid.
Simple Truth Is if they don’t order anything much, there will be no new jobs and hence no growth.
By the way does anyone know what Reforms defence plans are ? I just can’t find anything.