Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to the Answer of 9 September 2019 to Question 286671 on Defence in UK Prosperity Review, what recent progress has been made on arranging an international conference on the economic value of defence.

The Conference announced in the Written Ministerial Statement of 14 March 2019 (HCWS1411) will take place on 5 March. It will be held jointly with King's College London under the title "Assessing the Contribution of Defence to the UK Economy". It will bring together senior stakeholders from business, academia and Government to improve the understanding of how defence creates value across the UK and strengthens our ability to take account of this in future decisions.