Jim Dobbin
Main Page: Jim Dobbin (Labour (Co-op) - Heywood and Middleton)Department Debates - View all Jim Dobbin's debates with the Ministry of Defence
(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)
I give warning that I will call the Minister in this debate no later than 20 past 4. We have had a couple of problems in previous debates.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
I am delighted to have secured this debate on support for export sales of Typhoon aircraft. It also gives me great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dobbin. I am pleased that the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Aldershot (Mr Howarth), is responding. That is appropriate considering all that he has done on recent visits, on behalf of the Government, to India.
It is always a pleasure to speak on behalf of my hard-working constituents in Fylde, many of whom are employed in the aerospace industry. In my constituency, BAE Systems’ Warton site employs 6,272 people, with a further 4,000 employed in neighbouring Samlesbury. Indeed, BAE Systems provides one in four of all local manufacturing jobs in Fylde. Typhoon is the world-class platform on which the long-term success of UK military aerospace is predicated. That is why I called for today’s debate.
Those jobs are vital in our mission to rebalance the British economy, by returning manufacturing to its core. The military aerospace sector represents 70% of all UK defence exports, which are worth £4.5 billion a year to the British economy. Typhoon alone directly supports 10,000 jobs in the UK, and more than double that indirectly. At a time when all parties are rightly worried about youth unemployment, it is important to appreciate BAE Systems’ commitment to training and developing people, with 1,000 apprentices and 500 graduate trainees at any one time. It also sustains a supply chain made up of many small and medium-sized enterprises, including 1,200 suppliers in the north-west alone.