11-11-2013, 05:56 AM
[/hr]POLITICS | OPINIONS | SPORT | NATIONAL | LIFESTYLE | BUSINESS | INTERNATIONAL
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MONDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2013
[/hr]VOL. XCV .. Num. 34,661 | In the News: Central Bank Forecasts -- Police Brutality Report -- Weekend Sport
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by JOEY SESSIONS, Political Correspondent
Sanctus - Minister for Diplomatic Affairs Ben Sessions is to announce today that the current fleet of cars used for Sanctarian Ambassadors abroad will be phased out by the end of this year and replaced in the first few months of 2014. The range of Mercedes-Benz S-Class W221, which the Department of Foreign Affairs has been issuing to missions abroad, are no longer the most up-to-date model provided by Mercedes-Benz who have recently introduced a successor to the W221, the W222. According to government sources, however, Minister Sessions will not announce the continuation of the Department's association with Mercedes.
It is understood that to refit the entire fleet with the W222 would cost upwards of S£4.7m based on internal costings done by the Department. Instead, the Department of Foreign Affairs has decided to switch from Mercedes-Benz to Jaguar and will allocate to its Ministry of Diplomatic Affairs S£3,872,550 to purchase thirty-three Jaguar XFRs. Although the savings is only slight, Secretary Pontif has previously ordered civil servants and government officials within her Department and child Ministries to find savings wherever possible so more cash is made available for bigger projects.
Despite having far more than thirty-three diplomatic missions abroad, sources within the Ministry have indicated only missions marked active, and not dormant, will receive the new vehicles. It is also believed that the S£3.8m figure applies only to buying the XFRs for existing missions; purchasing vehicles for any new missions opened will obviously add to that cost.
The decision to refit the entire fleet with new cars just because of a new model being introduced by the manufacturer is unusual, but according to those in diplomatic circles, many of the currently used W221s are anywhere up to seven years old and vehicles for official government use are usually switched out after five years. The Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, and all Department Secretaries currently use BMW 7 series F01, a fleet of which was purchased in 2011. It is not believed that there are any plans to refit this fleet in the near future.