Oral Answers to Questions

Nigel Mills Excerpts

Monday 3rd February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer]

I am clearly not going to go into operational security from the Dispatch Box, but the hon. Member can rest assured that all the correct measures have been taken to ensure that our service personnel are protected abroad, whether it be in Baghdad or the other places where our troops are deployed. The Secretary of State will be providing a formal update on our counter-Daesh programme in due course.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)]

14. What recent estimate his Department has made of the number of jobs that defence procurement supports in the UK.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (James Heappey)]

MOD expenditure with UK industry and commerce supported 119,000 jobs in the UK in the financial year 2018-19, including more than 10,000 jobs in the midlands engine.

[Nigel Mills]

Many businesses across Amber Valley benefit from MOD contracts, but there are many more that could. What more can the Department do to work alongside businesses to help spread out these contracts and jobs around the country?

[James Heappey]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on raising this issue. Since taking on this brief, I have been interested to discover how the MOD might broaden access for small and medium-sized enterprises, and he represents exactly the sort of constituency where such opportunities are greatest. There will be businesses in his area that can contribute directly to the MOD supply chain, but with Rolls-Royce in Derby immediately to the south of his constituency, we can work with our prime contractors to ensure that they can also access those supply chains.