Antonia Bance
Main Page: Antonia Bance (Labour - Tipton and Wednesbury)Department Debates - View all Antonia Bance's debates with the Ministry of Defence
New Medium Helicopter Contract
Antonia Bance Excerpts(1 day, 10 hours ago)
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Luke Pollard
Deary me. It is this Labour Government who are increasing defence spending to the highest level since the end of the cold war. It is the Conservatives who hollowed out and underfunded our armed forces. In their first year in government, they cut defence spending by £2 billion. In their first five years of government, they cut defence spending by £12 billion. In their 14 years, they never once hit 2.5% of GDP on defence.
I remind the House that as the Defence Procurement Minister until the election, the hon. Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) left a defence programme that was overcommitted and underfunded. He left 47 of 49 major defence programmes over budget and delayed. He left forces families in terrible housing and our warfighters with broken kit. We are clearing up his mess while he focuses on gaslighting the public about the Tories’ record on defence.
Antonia Bance (Tipton and Wednesbury) (Lab)
I support calls by my union, Unite, for a speedy decision on crewed helicopters. I hope soon for good news on that front in the defence investment plan, which we all look forward to so very much. Might the Minister have any news on the manufacture of autonomous helicopters here in the UK, and on the good jobs that will come with them?
Luke Pollard
As a fellow Unite member, I recognise the importance of good, well-paid, unionised jobs in our defence industry. The opportunities in autonomy were set out clearly in the strategic defence review. We believe that a mix of crewed, uncrewed and autonomous systems—for not just some but all units of our armed forces—is the right future, in which we can increase our lethality and move towards warfighting readiness faster. When we do that correctly, as we will set out in the defence investment plan, more jobs will be created in British companies—and, potentially, at Leonardo—as they consider autonomous helicopters and uncrewed platforms working together to increase our armed forces’ lethality and ability.