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Defence

About Defence

Estate Rationalisation

One of the observations of the Defence Training Review (2001) was that the current training estate was too large, often under utilised and not necessarily fit for purpose.


Estate Rationalisation

Despite direct annual expenditure in the order of £1.5bn, the MOD estate is suffering from under-investment in many areas. There are three main reasons. First, much of the estate was built for a purpose different from that for which it is now being used. Consequently some of it gives a poor fit against today’s requirement, with very low utilisation in some areas. Second, a large part of the estate is in a rundown and deteriorating condition, requiring an increasing, disproportionate and unaffordable spend on its maintenance. Third, many of the sites are widely dispersed with low occupancy, preventing efficient and cost effective management.

Much rationalisation has been achieved over the past 10 years. A range of radical estate rationalisation measures are currently being considered by the MoD, including the creation of mainly Army ‘super garrisons’ and tri-Service ‘super sites’ to include multi-user functions, together with a review of UK airfields used for Defence purposes. Estate proposals underpinning the DTR Rationalisation Programme training solutions will need to dove-tail with these wider MOD rationalisation initiatives.

At present, the MOD is carrying out similar training activities on a single-Service basis over a disparate number of sites. The DTR Rationalisation Programme aims to collocate training establishments and reduce running costs and overheads in addition to modernising training delivery. Bidders' proposed developments of the Permanent Sites should be intensive to minimize the DTR Rationalisation Programme footprint in land usage terms. Proposals must be sufficiently flexible so that should the DTR Rationalisation Programme requirement reduce over the life of the Contracts, the MoD can reduce its occupation of sites/withdraw from sites, provided sufficient notice is given to the Contractor, with the Contractor finding alternative customers. The eventual use of redundant sites should be subject to the planning process and be consistent with wider government strategies such as the re-use of brown-field sites.

The Government’s Framework document on Sustainable Development places an onus upon MOD to ensure that its work and future plans take account of social, economic and environmental sustainability considerations.  Recognition of government sustainability policies must underpin DTR Rationalisation Programme decision making, for example, on long-term core sites for the training establishments, the design and location of buildings and the environmental heritage, as well as the use of energy and water resources should be considered.

Bidders may also consider non MOD sites on which to base a training stream or streams, particularly to meet MOD’s flexibility and innovation requirements, provided that the selection is consistent with the Department’s wider plans for the size and shape of the estate serving MOD outputs.