Officials are said to have been ordered to stop taking requests from Philip Hammond until his department the Treasury pays its bill
The Ministry of Defence has reportedly banned the chancellor from using RAF jets and helicopters until he settles a six-figure bill for the Treasury’s previous flights.
The Government department has run up an enormous bill taking trips with the No 31 Squadron, which deals with VIP bookings.
Officials are said to have been ordered to stop taking requests from Philip Hammond until his department pays its bill, The Times reports.
He has used BAe 146 jets and A109 helicopters more than 20 times this year on official business – including flights to Dudley, Aberdeen and Manchester as well as foreign destinations such as Frankfurt and Paris.
The jets offer three-course meals and alcoholic drinks as part of a first-class service.
Mr Hammond took the flights despite similar services being offered by budget airlines or trains at a fraction of the cost.
As well as the Treasury, the fleet of planes can also be used by the prime minister, foreign secretary and Brexit secretary.
A defence insider told The Times: ‘At the same time as claiming our brave armed forces don’t need any more money and that the army only needs 50,000 troops, it is a huge double standard to willingly use the armed forces’ facilities at the same time as refusing to pay for them.
Another added: ‘The bill is a six-figure sum. At the moment he is banned from using the flights until he pays for it. It is like getting an Uber account if you don’t pay.’
It comes after Philip Hammond angered defence bosses amid claims he told Theresa May the army can function with just 50,000 troops.
Cabinet sources said the Chancellor made the claim at No.10, while in a heated meeting discussing new defence cuts with former Defence Secretary, Sir Michael Fallon.
He said that would be enough to send a division to fight a war, according to The Sun.
But senior military chiefs said that an army of that size would only be able to sustain any war for about six months.
It comes after Philip Hammond angered defence bosses amid claims he told Theresa May the army can function with just 50,000 troops. The Ministry of Defence headquarters in London are pictured (stock photo)
Tory MP Johnny Mercer, a former Army officer, told The Sun: ‘We couldn’t even fulfil our Nato commitments with 50,000, let alone mount a sustained defence of our nation or its dependent territories.’
The Army is currently 4,000 short of what it should be, with 78,000 troops.
Cutting it down by 28,000 would make it the smallest it has been in 220 years and fall short of Germany’s 60,000.
Meanwhile it was reported that the pound’s low value against the dollar represents a big risk to Britain’s £9.1billion programme to buy 138 of the world’s most advanced war plane.
The UK has 13 F-35 fighter jets, made by American manufacturer Lockheed Martin, in the US being tested ahead of flight trials from HMS Queen Elizabeth next year, and plans to buy 138 more.
But the MoD’s most senior civil servant Stephen Lovegrove said he worries about how the foreign exchange position will affect defence procurement.
He said: ‘That is a big risk, that is a big risk right across the equipment programme, and clearly the biggest risk is against the dollar because we spend a lot more in dollars.’
This comes after allies of Mr Hammond accused Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson of stirring up a ‘bogus’ war on defence cuts to win over Armed Forces chiefs.
In an extraordinary attack they blamed Mr Williamson for a backbench rebellion, which they said was designed to distract attention from the row over his fast-track promotion to the Cabinet.
One source ridiculed Mr Williamson’s lack of defence experience, saying: ‘When Williamson is in with all these grizzled old Forces types he just sits there looking like Private Pike from Dad’s Army.’