The Ministry of Defence’s top 19 weapons projects will be delivered 36 years later than planned, when all the delays are aggregated, the National Audit Office said yesterday.

The NAO, in its annual Major Projects Report, said that the total figure of 433 months in delays was dominated by a small number of “legacy” projects.

One of them, the Nimrod MRA4 maritime and attack aircraft, was currently forecast to take more than double the time originally predicted, the NAO said.

The first Astute nuclearpowered submarine, now under construction, is due to enter service in 2008, three and a half years late. However, that is a slight improvement on last year’s prediction. The report revealed that the MoD had ordered and paid for spares for 21 Nimrods, yet the number of aircraft on order has been cut to 12.

Tim Banfield, who co-ordinated the NAO study, said that the spares would have to be stored at extra cost.

One of the longest-running projects is the Typhoon/ Eurofighter combat aircraft. The RAF has delivered 12 in the past year. However, the NAO revealed that RAF fighter pilots flying the Typhoon have been unable to test-fire a crucial Meteor air-to-air missile because of a clash over costs with Britain’s partners in the collaborative programme.

Sir Peter Spencer, the Chief of Defence Procurement, underlined the MoD’s anger over the way the Typhoon collaboration was developing, pledging: “We’re going to turn this charity into a business.”

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