Future Combat Air System: Finance
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to the Answer of 24 July 2025 to Question HL9397 on Typhoon Aircraft: Factories, what proportion of the funding for Combat Air will be spent with companies in the North West.
Answered by Luke Pollard
The planned Combat Air investment will benefit every region of the United Kingdom in the next ten years. In a new era of threat, we need a new era for our defence industry and the Defence Industrial Strategy launched on 8 September 2025 is designed not just to spend more, but to spend smarter: speeding up development to delivery (factory to frontline) and ensuring our defence investment benefits local communities.
A significant proportion of investment will be devoted to companies in north-west England as a key region for the manufacture of fixed-wing military aircraft, and support of complex weapon systems from concept to delivery. The region also offers unique platform and system testing capabilities.
The Defence Investment Plan will be published in the Autumn and provide further detail on how we will deliver our Strategic Defence Review vision for Combat Air investment.
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