An announcement on whether the Royal Air Force (RAF) will retain all five of its Sentinel R1 intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft, or reduce the fleet to four, has been delayed until at least June.
Reports indicated that a decision on keeping the fifth aircraft would be made at the end of the UK financial year last month, in line with the MoD's yearly spending review known as the annual budget cycle (ABC17).
Now that decision is unlikely to be made until after the UK's general election on June 8. Under UK electoral rules, the government and civil servants