back to article MoD slashes IT jobs

Computer specialist posts will be axed as part of the defence ministry's latest round of cost cuts. IT staff will be among 1,000 civilians to lose their jobs at the Ministry of Defence's (MoD) Whitehall headquarters as part of a "streamlining programme". The MoD said the loss of posts, amounting to a 25 per cent staff …

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  1. amanfromMars Silver badge

    Foreign Waste or Home Grown Excellence.

    And in what fields are these "defence priorities"?

    Is there a list for budding contractors/entrepreneurs to fill/tender for, or is it more pork off the barrel to fill the existing feeding trough and its offensive priorities rather than Innovative UltraModern Defence?

    I suppose Lord Drayson would be the man to ask. He's more likely to be up to speed on those issues rather than any pedestrian secretary type, such as Des Browne.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    example

    "Ministers, chiefs of staff and our most senior officials will lead this process by example and with greater direct accountability for areas and budgets."

    no chance the example would be firing themselves I guess

  3. Dave
    Stop

    confused tangle of disconnected numbers and stats

    awful - 1000 cuts, 25% - later on 18,000 members of a union

    ???

    The best bit is: "Ministers, chiefs of staff and our most senior officials will lead this process by example and with greater direct accountability for areas and budgets."

    are they all volunteering for redundancy?

  4. Paul

    £50M

    Isent that spare change to the MoD? About the 1/3 of the cost of 1 of the RAF's 240 Euro fighters. I dont want to even think of the cost compaird to a Tridant.

  5. Slaine
    Paris Hilton

    no suprise there then...

    To be completely honest - I'd have thought that, given the prevolence for cyber crime (including but not limited to the wonderful world full of identity cloning, online credit frauds, bank and finance scams, illegal and immoral image sharing, P2P filesharing, DoS attacks, multi-layered data encryption, email interceptions, spamming and the ilk) and the wholescale adoption of the internet for work, rest and play... that the ONLY defence department in need of ANY funding would be IT.

    Logic dictates therefore that it should be this already underfunded department that is whittled down further until, one suspects, there remains only an executive planning director, 12 senior managers, 30 deputy managers, 200 local area managers and a couple of tea ladys.

  6. stalker

    as always....

    its the IT guys who suffer first, as noone can "physically" see what we provide...they seem to think that the servers/mail/file/print/desktops will run themselves, and we are only here to fix it when it goes wrong rather than keeping everything balanced on the knife edge of production/failure that the users force us into daily :-/

    How long before the MOD start a massive recruitment drive/bidding war for contract IT services??

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    No-brainer

    Obviously, to get value-for-money, MOD IT should be outsourced to EDS or Crapita.

  8. amanfromMars Silver badge

    Knock, bloody Knock.

    "How long before the MOD start a massive recruitment drive/bidding war for contract IT services??"

    Would they know a star of contract IT services, even if they presented their wares/introduced themselves to the MOD? The Virtual Technology Capabilities of those pushing the envelope would most probably baffle them and sounds madly incredulous and anyone who would have an inkling is probably squirrelled away in some bunker somewhere.

    And I cannot see any Sense in expecting to get relevant Defence Information from Budding Contractors, with a massive recruitment drive/bidding war, as the Information they really need, needs to be protected from prying eyes. Reading between the lines is what they will have to Excel at in order to XXXXtrapolate Advanced Intelligent Information.... however with most of them still painting by numbers the chances of them joining up Dots in AIMatrix with Semantic Analysis of Key Codes is slim. Fortunately, Hope Springs Eternal in Excellence Circles and one can always go straight to the top and Register IT and send it to HMGCC...... Ye Olde Worlde Boffin Territory.

    Then a little trickle feed to XXXXpand upon the Lode will do no Harm but flogging a dead horse is never going to breathe Life into a Dead Parrot. .... although there is always the Light Fantastic, Goon Secret Weapon. That could Summon up some Treasury Reserves for Special Relationship Ops.

    But Chinese Whispers and Russian Dolls Really are as valid for NeuReal Technological XXXXChange nowadays and they have just as much to Offer in NEUKlearer Fields as a Colonel Blimp/Flying a Desk type, if he is not up to the Job.

    Crikey, I've Exhausted Exasperation there. I'm off for a Refill. Hold the Fort, there's a good chap.

  9. Beachhutman

    fear not folks

    for they'll all get jobs with the new ID cards database setup, until it turns out that LSE's 20 Billion was a gross underestimate, and they all get sacked again

    But then there's the eu Gallileo road pricing project

    and the DNA database

    Oh, and the NHS COMPUTER PROJECT

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