His support for the prime minister's new jobs contract has been tepid at best.

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The then-prime minister's drive to contract out public-sector tasks to the private sector laid the foundations for firms taking over such services as school and hospital meals, buildings maintenance and even staff training.

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An older player often winds up with a lengthy contract that runs past his prime.

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In fact, the agency will get no credit if the contract is a sub to an existing Prime, like most are with DOE.

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For those that can remember, the contract, which named Boeing as a prime contractor to build a security fence on the US- Mexico border, was terminated in 2011, because it was considered to be too expensive and ineffective.

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Inking a productive veteran to a long-term contract that figures to take him past his prime is a risk many clubs have taken under pressure to win (though some showed signs of reining in the practice during the 2009 recession--the Yankees bidding adieu to 36-year-old Johnny Damon, for instance).

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Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg had earlier told workers at Rosyth, that by safeguarding the contract for HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales, thousands of jobs in Fife and on the Clyde had been secured.

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But the real story is that by dangling discounted contract extensions to younger players that are aimed at locking them up through their prime years, both the game's richest and poorest teams have made startling progress in their efforts to convince players to stop selling themselves.

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