Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment his Department has made of the capacity of the new aircraft carriers to use data from the F-35 Lightning effectively.
It would be inappropriate to comment in detail on the capacity of the aircraft carriers to use data from the F-35B as to do so would or could be likely to prejudice the capability of our Armed Forces.
However, I can confirm that the aircraft carriers have a dedicated, integrated mission planning and de-brief facility which is used to analyse data the F-35Bs have gathered during their mission. These facilities proved invaluable on the most recent Carrier Strike Group deployment (CSG21) and provide a significant organic capability for the Ministry of Defence now and into the future.