Letters - 25 June 2010

22 Jun 2010 | by

From the strategic defence review to a fun-filled AGM.

Fun at the Leaveners’ AGM

Defence spending review

A new £450 million hospital in the north east has been axed as part of the government spending cuts.

The Defence Review will include the following items:

135 x American F35 fighter bombers at £111,000,000 each, total cost £25,000,000,000
2 x Q E Class Aircraft Carriers at £2,500,000,000 each, total cost £5,000,000,000
6 x Type 45 Destroyers at £1,070,000,000 each, total cost £6,460,000,000
7 x Astute Class submarines at £1,142,000,000 each, total cost £8,000,000,000
132 x Typhoon Fighter aircraft at £162,000,000 each, total cost £20,000,000,000
25 x Airbus A400 military aircraft at £800,000,000 each, total cost £20,000,000,000

The total cost of the above items, at current prices, is £84,460,000,000 (£84.46 billion), equal to almost half of the stated national debt, and enough to fund 187 new hospitals. The list does not include our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, nor Trident, the UK’s own weapon of mass destruction, which the government intends to exclude from its so-called ‘root and branch’ defence review, at a cost of not less than £25 billion, and possibly as much as £76 billion. The average household will contribute about £2,500 in tax towards the UK’s military budget in the current financial year, while public services are to be severely curtailed.

I think inclusion of all the noughts better reveals the costs for what they are.

Enough said?
Ken Veitch

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