AUKUS: Procurement
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises located in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency benefit from AUKUS-related procurement opportunities.
Answered by Luke Pollard
This Government is committed to strengthening UK security and boosting the UK economy. Through the Defence Industrial Strategy defence spending with small and medium-sized firms will increase by £2.5 billion by Summer 2028 - taking the total spend to £7.5 billion, a 50% uplift. This marks a step change in ensuring smaller businesses benefit from defence procurement.
The AUKUS partnership will create new contract opportunities for hundreds of small and medium-sized firms. It will create 7,000 new jobs both in UK shipyards and across the UK supply chain.
The Ministry of Defence is engaging UK Industry, including SMEs, through the AUKUS Advanced Capabilities Industry Forum (ACIF), the trilateral mechanism for Government and Industry to identify barriers and improve access to AUKUS Pillar 2 opportunities.
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