F-35 Purchase Cancelled

OTTAWA — The F-35 jet fighter purchase, the most persistent thorn in the federal government's side and the subject of a devastating auditor-general's report last spring, is dead.

Faced with the imminent release of an audit by accountants KPMG that will push the total projected life-cycle costs of the aircraft above $30 billion, the operations committee of the federal Cabinet decided to scrap the controversial sole-source program and go back to the drawing board, a source familiar with the decision said.