Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment his Department has made of the feasibility of fitting a catapult system to Aircraft Carriers.

Since the Queen Elizabeth Class carriers entered service no such feasibility assessment has been made. In the coming years the intent is to expand experimentation of Uncrewed Air Systems (UAS) with Royal Navy vessels. This may include a number of projects to consider UAS capabilities for the Queen Elizabeth Class carriers, including Fixed Wing UAS. The launch and recovery systems for these capabilities may require assessments which could include catapult systems.