Defence: British Steel

Debate between Earl Howe and Lord Hoyle

Tuesday 30th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hoyle]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure the use of more British steel in defence contracts.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Earl Howe) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are committed to supporting the British steel industry and we have policy guidance in place to address any barriers that prevent UK steel producers competing effectively in the open market. We remain engaged with our prime contractors to ensure their support in implementing this. The Government also publish their future pipeline for steel requirements on GOV.UK, which enables UK steel manufacturers to better plan and bid for government contracts.

[Lord Hoyle (Lab)]

I put it to the Minister that using more British steel would overcome the uncertainty in relation to Brexit. It would bring more prosperity to steel-producing areas and more job security for British steelworkers. Using only 40% British steel on defence projects is far too low. Surely we should be using 100% British steel in all our defence programmes.

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, looking at recent warship procurement programmes, it is generally true to say that steel has been sourced from abroad in cases where UK steel suppliers have not been able to produce steel to the required grade. If one sets that issue aside, UK producers have generally proved to be very competitive, as demonstrated by the Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier programme, for which 88% of the structural steel was sourced from UK mills.