Firstly the argument in this thread is about the necessity for the form to be available in 55 languages, although it is being corrupted into another debate about the census itself.

Secondly the “pseudo-Daily Mail outrage”, whatever that phrase means, is not against doing something the government wants but against its purpose. That is quite different.

My apologies. I hadn’t realized you were part of the forum police. If this doesn’t drift off-topic (or “corrupted” as you put it) it must be one the very few on here that doesn’t.

Your second para? No it isn’t – it just a Daily Mail-esque whine about something the government wants. Many aspects of future policy are dependent on need; why not give them the information they want. Being in many languages makes it a little easier – is that too much to ask?
As I said before, just fill in the damned form.

I have to say that I’m not massively surprised at the psuedo-Daily Mail outrage at having to do something the government wants.

Censuses (Censi ?) have been carried out for centuries to allow governments to make informed decisions about future plans. Why is it such a a big deal?

It takes 15 minutes every 10 years to fill in the form, hardly an onerous task – just do as you’re told and fill it in.

As I said previously, it was dreadful project to work on, it should have been scrapped years ago but having come this far, I believe it should have been allowed to continue. The £4bn spent has now been utterly wasted.

Short-termism is what drives our entire economy now and is why there is no investment in anything worthwhile. We as consumers are as much to blame for that situation as anyone else.

Diseca, I understand the nicknames that BAe/BAE have been subject but perhaps you would like to make your statement to those at Woodford receiving their redundancy notices today. Most of us that worked on MRA4 worked bloody hard to make it work, despite the difficulties put in our way.

A sad time anyway.

To be honest, almost any other airframe rather than Nimrod would have been better. An A320 or 737 based aircraft could have worked. Having the engines buried in the wings caused many more problems that they solved. A wider fuselage would have helped as well. The main reason the project was so late was the inability to solve in good time the many problems encountered. The reason wasn’t political either – it was cultural.

The MR2 was a fine aircraft; the MRA4 was a development too far.

Which parts of MRA4 were out of date?

The airframes and engines were new build (apart from the fuselage shell) and the performance was much better than the MR2 (which was regarded as the best in the world I think) and better range than not-yet-in-service Poseidon P-8. Radars and avionics were also new…

…and the Boeing mission system was similar to the system that will be installed in the US Poseidon P-8 that will not enter service until 2013 at the earliest…..or is that out-of-date too?

The aircraft was due in service in 2000 – a delay until 2012 meant that even brand new, some systems were at least 12 years old. The “state of the art” flight deck was based on the A340 and is now at least 15 years old.

The range was considerably better than the MR2 but the max speed and max altitude were slower and lower than the MR2 and so on and so on….

So very sad, nay criminal really. I feel so bad for the everyone involved, if BAe had kept their 20% in Airbus would things have turned out different for Woodford?

Paul

No, I don’t think so. BAe/BAE had wanted out of the airliner manufacturing business since the early 1990s but rather embarrassingly airlines kept ordering 146s and RJs – not in large numbers but in a steady stream. The product was never invested in properly so was left to wither; even the RJX was not the radical relaunch it should have been. Even when airlines actually wanted large orders the company would not invest in increasing the production rate to cope; they were too worried about over-capacity in case the orders dried up.
I believe the cancellation of the RJ/RJX was the death-knell for Woodford. After that there was no hint of any follow-up work after MRA4 was finished. Well it’s nearly gone know. In a few years time the airfield will be as distant a memory as the one at Hatfield.

We had some RC models flying at Woodford today – that’s as good as it’s going to get.

PM sent J31/32