Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 10th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robathan]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question, because I, too, absolutely support the cadet forces. They do fantastic work that is very much in tune with the Government’s policy of the national citizen service. They keep children off the streets and give them excellent training and discipline, which I think we all applaud. We also have the youth engagement review, but I will brief her on that later if she would like, because you, Mr Speaker, would stop me if I went on too long now.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T6. The Secretary of State and I have a considerable number of constituents who work at the MOD’s Abbey Wood site in Filton. There is real uncertainty there at the moment about how many jobs will be lost, what new work will be sent there and what work will be lost. Could he give some certainty to the people working at the plant about the future of their jobs?

[Peter Luff]

I make regular visits to the Filton Abbey Wood site, as the hon. Lady knows, to discuss those issues with the staff, and I appreciate the concern that they face. The chief of defence matériel, Bernard Gray, is currently conducting a full review of matériel strategy and how the organisation will be structured in future, and I hope that its outcome will give precisely the certainty that she rightly seeks for her constituents.