Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of procurement rules on bank lending to SME companies involved in defence.

The Government is committed to making SMEs a national priority, ensuring they have a fair opportunity to win public contracts and setting ambitious SME spend targets.

As set out in the Defence Industrial Strategy, the MOD is backing British Jobs, British Industry and British innovators. Since July 2024, we have signed 1,100 major contracts, with 84% of our annual spend going to British companies.

In January we launched a dedicated Defence Office for Small business Growth to boost opportunities and access to defence contracts and the supply chain, on top of our commitment to double direct spend with SMEs by £2.5 billion by May 2028.

Delivering on the commitments made in the Strategic Defence Review and the Defence Industrial Strategy, we are developing a dedicated Defence Finance and Investment Strategy (DFIS). This is supported by a new Defence Investors’ Advisory Group, bringing together senior expertise from venture, growth, private capital, and banking to address barriers to financing and investment in the sector.