Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Spellar Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Defence People, Veterans and Service Families (Dr Andrew Murrison)]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for her question, and I reiterate once again my thanks for all the hard work she has done on behalf of women in defence. She is quite right: it is unacceptable. Today, the permanent secretary has written to the Department with an action plan on how to deal with the specific issue my hon. Friend has raised, in particular asking our non-executive directors to conduct a review, so that we can ensure that what we are doing stands up to muster against the norms in other large organisations.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

T7. The Ukraine conflict has reinforced the need for a thriving defence industry to underpin our security. Will the Secretary of State now take the opportunity to revisit his predecessor’s policy of placing so many orders abroad, rather than in British industry with British workers, and in particular, the building of the fleet solid support ships in foreign yards?

[James Cartlidge]

The right hon. Gentleman talks about the fleet solid support ships being built in foreign yards. I can assure him that recently, I had the great pleasure of visiting Harland & Wolff at its Appledore yard in north Devon. That is in the UK, and it is where a significant part of the FSS contract will be made.