Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many students have enrolled in the Defence Digital and Cyber Bursary scheme in each academic year since it was launched; and how many of those students are based in Lancashire.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
285 new students have enrolled in the latest cohort, taking the total number of students to 500. This follows an announcement in October 2025, where the Ministry of Defence expanded the scheme to 500 fully funded places for college-age students across Lancashire. This information is provided below:
Cohort | Academic Year | Intake | Status |
Cohort 1 | 2024-25 | 100 | Graduated |
Cohort 2 | 2025-26 | 115 | Year 13 students |
Cohort 3 | 2025-26 | 285 | Year 12 students and latest cohort |
All students are based in Lancashire, through partnerships with Digital Skills for Defence (DS4D) and the Lancashire Skills and Employment Hub.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much funding has been allocated to the Defence Digital and Cyber Bursary scheme since its inception; and what proportion of that funding has been spent to date.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
To date, £2 million has been allocated to this scheme, of which £1.2 million has already been spent. A further £0.8 million is scheduled to be released within the next two weeks to support the latest intake.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what proportion of the £400 million allocated to UK Defence Innovation in 2025-26 will be available to firms outside the designated factory locations, including in the North West.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
UK Defence Innovation (UKDI) will support high-tech businesses across the UK, including the North west. The ringfenced budget of £400 million for 2025-26 will focus on novel technologies, including dual-use systems.
UKDI will invest in structures to support business growth and to increase investment into SMEs, start-ups, and non-traditional defence suppliers to support a diverse and agile supply chain across the UK.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of enabling existing defence-manufacturing clusters in the North West, including aerospace and advanced materials firms, to contribute to the planned ‘always on’ munitions pipeline.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
We are committed to ensuring the Defence industry is an engine for growth through strengthened industrial relationships and domestic investment. As published in the UK Defence Footprint the North West region has seen £4.8 billion of Defence spending in 2024-25. We have committed £6 billion this Parliament towards munitions, as outlined in the Strategic Defence Review 2025, which supports defence capacity whilst generating local jobs and economic prosperity. This investment includes £1.5 billion for building six new energetics and munitions factories in the UK to deliver an 'always on' pipeline, locations and arrangements of which are being assessed through ongoing work. Whilst it is currently premature to comment on specific site proposals and their assessment, more detail will be available once the necessary preparatory work has been completed.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what criteria he used to determine the potential sites for the new munitions and energetics factories; and if he will publish the assessment methodology.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
We are committed to ensuring the Defence industry is an engine for growth through strengthened industrial relationships and domestic investment. As published in the UK Defence Footprint the North West region has seen £4.8 billion of Defence spending in 2024-25. We have committed £6 billion this Parliament towards munitions, as outlined in the Strategic Defence Review 2025, which supports defence capacity whilst generating local jobs and economic prosperity. This investment includes £1.5 billion for building six new energetics and munitions factories in the UK to deliver an 'always on' pipeline, locations and arrangements of which are being assessed through ongoing work. Whilst it is currently premature to comment on specific site proposals and their assessment, more detail will be available once the necessary preparatory work has been completed.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, when the Armed Forces Commissioner is expected to be appointed; and when the Commissioner's office is expected to be fully operational.
Answered by Louise Sandher-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
We are in the process of recruiting an Armed Forces Commissioner . It is expected that a Commissioner will be appointed in early 2026, with plans for their office to be fully operational in April 2026. The role is subject to scrutiny in accordance with the principles of the Governance Code on Public Appointments and overseen by the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments. We remain committed to appointing the right person for this critical role, which is central to delivering a trusted and effective service for our people.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to paragraph 2.6 of the report entitled The UK’s F-35 capability, HC 989, published by the National Audit Office on 11 July 2025, what steps are being taken to address personnel shortfalls within the F‑35 programme.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
We inherited a retention and recruitment crisis from the last Government and are determined to fix it.
The Ministry of Defence (MOD) has introduced a programme of surging recruitment for the RAF so that it returns to workforce balance across every specialisation.
This activity includes a significant focus on the engineer profession where, over the last two years, the RAF has offered joining bonuses and increased the capacity of Technical Training Schools to enable more recruits to be trained.
To improve retention, the RAF has implemented a Financial Retention Incentive for engineers.
The recruitment and retention of personnel remains one of the top two priorities for the Chief of the Defence Staff.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to paragraph 22 of the report entitled The UK’s F-35 capability, HC 989, published by the National Audit Office on 11 July 2025, if he will set out the updated estimate of the whole‑life cost of the (a) equipment, (b) personnel, (c) infrastructure, (d) fuel, (e) ammunition and (f) total cost of the F‑35 programme.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The F-35 programme reports costs to the Departments and National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA) policy as a Government Major Projects Portfolio (GMPP). My Department will address the Public Accounts Committee recommendations in the formal Government response to the Committee in due course.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the use of GPS-enabled smart watches on the security of UK defence sites.
Answered by Al Carns - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans)
The Ministry of Defence has strict rules governing where smart devices, including GPS-enabled smart watches, can and cannot be used. We do not comment on the detail of those measures.
Asked by: Andrew Snowden (Conservative - Fylde)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the US government shutdown on joint UK–US defence (a) projects and (b) research collaboration.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
There has been no impact on our defence projects or research collaboration where we have continued to engage with those essential US staff who continued to work during the shutdown.