Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will make it his policy to bring forward the delivery date for the F-35 fleet.

UK F-35 aircraft are being procured in ‘Tranches’, in line with Defence need. Delivery of our Tranche 1 buy (48 aircraft) will complete by 2025. The Government has outlined plans to buy a further 27 aircraft as part of a second procurement phase, which we expect to complete in the early part of the next decade. We expect the production line to continue to run for many years. We will consider again in the mid-2020s the F-35 fleet size as part of the next Strategic Defence Review