Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he is taking to (a) reduce losses of public funding to fraud during defence procurement and (b) increase the amount of funding recovered from those losses.

The Department has robust financial and commercial controls governing procurement, including single source regulations as set out in the Defence Reform Act 2014. In addition, we have introduced Initial Fraud Impact Assessments for major Defence programmes to identify, assess and mitigate fraud risks from the outset.

The Department has increased recoveries through the use of data analytics technology, leading to the prevention and recovery of £6.4 million last financial year 2024/25. We are continuing to expand our use of AI to support the prevention, detection and recovery of losses from fraud and error.