BAE said in February it would "sustain jobs, create hundreds of millions of pounds of future exports for the UK, preserve an industrial base that secures UK sovereignty, and create significant cost savings" if it won the armoured reconnaissance vehicle contract known as FRES Scout, and further work on upgrading the Warrior fighting vehicle.  The Ministry of Defence also put off awarding the Warrior contract before the election, and no decision is expected until after the strategic review is completed in October. The MoD has a £35bn spending black hole to plug.  A spokesman for the company said: "We must resize the UK land business to a reduced expected workload and we are working towards this at the moment. As you'd expect, we can't comment on the nature or timing of any cuts before we have told our own people."  The previous government's decision to award to FRES contract to GD only weeks before the general election was attacked at the time as being the work of "a bankrupt shopaholic having one last binge on their way to jail," by Dr Liam Fox, then the shadow defence secretary and now the Defence Secretary.  Earlier this month, Dr Fox said the Government needed to be "very brutal" about cutting defence costs, and paved the way for equipment cuts, saying "the future programme is not affordable if we continue to try to do all the things we already do".  The Tories have made a manifesto commitment to increase defence exports, saying it is the only way profitably to maintain the domestic industry needed to supply Britain's armed forces.  Dr Fox has identified Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Norway as potential customers or partners in joint procurement and export programmes.  The Ministry of Defence's £36.9bn budget is protected for this year, but after that analysts expect cuts of up to 15pc over the next four years.
BAE Systems, Britain's biggest defence company, is set to cut hundreds of jobs   in its UK vehicles business in the coming weeks.