Oral Answers to Questions

Madeleine Moon Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Harriett Baldwin]

Yes, in March this year we reduced the profit rate on single-source contracts from 10.6% to 8.95%. The regulator will then recommend a rate for 2017, which we will consider carefully, along with its recommendation on multiple profit rates.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

What steps will the Minister take to ensure that, where single-source contracting is placed abroad with, say, American companies, there are appropriate levels of set-aside, so that apprenticeships and the seed-corning for future capability in British defence companies are protected and facilitated?

[Harriett Baldwin]

The hon. Lady will be aware that that is an ongoing subject of discussion, and of the commitment that General Dynamics has made in Wales in the part of the world she represents to create 250 jobs in the supply chain for the Ajax vehicles.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)]

The British Royal Navy is now smaller than the flotilla that we sent to take back the Falkland Islands. When will we have a date for Type 45 destroyer engine repairs and replacements, which are desperately needed, so that we can at least maintain the 19 ships of the line that we currently have?

[Michael Fallon]

I hope that the hon. Lady, who knows a lot about this, is not confusing number with quality or power. The ships we are now deploying—the aircraft carriers, the Type 45 destroyers and the forthcoming Type 26 frigates—are of course much more powerful than the ships that sailed to liberate the Falkland Islands. I know she will join me in welcoming the new missions of the two Type 45s, HMS Diamond and HMS Daring, which sailed in the past few weeks.