Them's the badgers, based on cruise ship cabins, all plug in and play, except, on ships they unplug and replace them every few years, nor expect them to last 15 years
Or more precisely, cruise ships are built via modular construction methods (AKA prefabricated buildings) which are well known for post war reconstruction but have been around for centuries.
It would be more accurate to state that defence modular construction programmes are based on the Department for Educations schools construction programme.
True SLAM with Balfour Beatty came with construction plus 7 years of building maintenance, PAC PFI is a 30 year contract, so if a building lasts only 15 years then they will have to replace it within the contract. (That’s why the PAC PFI contract to do any work comes at a higher price for both initial work and continued maintenance / life cycle replacement), I don’t know what the arrangement was for PFI Colchester but that was underway more than 15 years ago.
Is it better to have an estate that’s a mix of Victorian and second hand RAF WW2 construction and to have a government that is surprised that money needs to be spent on it following 40+ years of slashing infrastructure or replacements that are predicted to last 15 years telling government that they need to be maintained and replaced at a later date?
Are Defence needs in 15 years going to be the same as today? Would they be able to have something more suitable for their needs then than Defence has today with an 80 year old estate?