To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many variants of the Future Surface Combatant will be designed; and how many ships in each such variant he expects to be constructed. (321414)

[holding answer 11 March 2010]: The Future Surface Combatant programme is expected to consist of two variants. The C1, an Anti Submarine Warfare task group enabled platform and the C2 variant, a more general purpose platform. There is a separate Mine Countermeasures, Hydrographic and Patrol Capability programme, which was previously referred to as C3.

No decisions have yet been made on the number of ships to be constructed; this will be decided at the main investment decision point for each variant.