Question to the Scotland Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, whether his Department has made an assessment of the economic contributions of Ministry of Defence contracts to the shipbuilding industry in Scotland.

The £3.7 billion Ministry of Defence contract for the first three Type 26 frigates, to be followed by five more, and the £635 million investment in the Offshore Patrol Vessel programme have guaranteed the shipbuilding industry on the Clyde work for 20 years and safeguarded 1,700 shipbuilding jobs in Scotland.

Additionally, the second of the Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers is currently being fitted out in Rosyth, and the National Shipbuilding Strategy has set out our commitment to a competition to design and build Type 31e frigates here in the UK.