Written questions by Obese-Jecty.

With reference to page 106 of the Strategic Defence Review, updated on 8 July 2025, what progress he has made in enhancing the mandate of the Defence Maritime Regulator.

The Defence Maritime Regulator (DMR) is currently developing several options for defence to consider and progress. These options are being developed in conjunction with defence stakeholders and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) and will be presented for consideration by April 2026. The current options vary in scale and scope, but all allow for the unique legislative freedoms afforded to the Royal Navy and to Defence Shipping to be utilised to support the development of Maritime Autonomy. DMR is supporting the ongoing development of the MCA’s own maritime autonomy programme as the two organisations strive to deliver safe and environmentally sound shipping in the defence and civil sectors.

What assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of awarding the first certification for a remotely operated and unmanned vessel under the Maritime and Coastguard Agency’s Workboat Code Edition 3 Annex 2 to the ACUA Ocean PIONEER.

A substantial number of unmanned systems are operated remotely both within the UK and internationally under Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) certification, including compliance with the latest iteration of the Workboat Code. Where appropriate, the Department actively collaborates with manufacturers and operators of these systems to explore and address synergies between civilian and military applications, ensuring alignment with operational requirements and advancing innovation in this evolving domain.

What (a) Royal Navy and (b) partner forces helicopters are able to use the Helicopter Visual Landing Aid System.

The planned timeline for installation of Glamox HVLAS (Helicopter Visual Landing Aid System) to the remainder of the Batch 2 Offshore Patrol Vessel (OPV) Fleet is aligned to the platform’s five Annual Recertification Maintenance Periods. An exception to this may be due to operational requirement, or if there is a funding and timing opportunity to enable the advancement of installation work. Wildcat are the Royal Navy’s cleared aircraft and HVLAS is suitable for all aircraft from Partner Nations, although limited by their size and weight.

With reference to page 130 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on ensuring Defence Medical Services capability reflects the five priority areas of the NATO Medical Action Plan.

A key recommendation of the Strategic Defence Review is rebuilding medical capacity and capability, together with the NHS, to ensure our Armed Forces remain fighting fit in peacetime and are prepared to meet operational demands when at war. With allies, through the NATO Medical Action Plan we are focused on addressing priority challenges in workforce; mass casualty planning; patient evacuation; and medical logistics. We will look to address legislative and regulatory barriers to effective care. The Defence Investment Plan will set out how the Ministry of Defence and will deliver the vision of the Strategic Defence Review over the next 10 years, including to ensure that the Defence Medical Services and the NHS together have capacity to meet Defence medical needs, including in the most extreme circumstances.

With reference to page 131 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, update on 8 July 2025, what investment he is making in clinical research and development.

The Strategic Defence Review recognises sustaining Defence investment in clinical research and development (R&D) and working with industry and academia, is essential to wider clinical value and use, including within the NHS. Defence Medical Services (DMS) works with academia and industry to carry out military medical research in areas such as anaesthesia and critical care, emergency medicine, mental health, surgery and trauma, and orthopaedics. The DMS budget for clinical R&D in these areas is £1.5 million per year, supplemented by significant leveraged funding from partner nations, charities, and national medical research funders. DMS is collaborating with the National Institute for Health and Care Research to co-fund Fellowships in military medicine. In collaboration with the Medical Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation, Defence is investing in the development of a Centre of Research Excellence in Novel Blood Products. This work will address key priorities for DMS such as ensuring adequate blood supply on operations and supporting the next generation of military medical research leaders.

With reference to recommendation 58 of the Strategic Defence Review, updated on 8 July 2025, what progress he has made in investing in (a) medical evacuation and (b) medical stockpiles.

The Defence Investment Plan will set out how the Ministry of Defence (MOD) will deliver the vision of the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) over the next 10 years, including confirming the funding available to improve the physical and digital infrastructure of Defence Medical Services, together with medical evacuation and medical stockpiles. The SDR commits the MOD to establish a ten-year physical infrastructure plan for Defence medical by February 2026, including options for medical infrastructure drawing on the NHS and private finance.

Whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of increasing levels of defence exports to Poland to support its East Shield programme.

The UK is committed to supporting Poland to develop its border security in the face of Russian aggression and has considered how to support Poland's East Shield programme in light of this. We continue to work with UK industry to consider and review export opportunities presented by this programme, including ways of increasing prosperity across the UK.

What recent progress he has made on implementing a new non-tidal maintenance berth as part of the Submarine Waterfront Infrastructure Future project.

The Submarine Waterfront Infrastructure Future (SWIF) programme will provide facilities to locations such as Devenport that include a new non-tidal maintenance berth in 5 Basin, a refurbished 10 Dock, and supporting buildings and services. Significant planning has been undertaken in preparation for build, including working with the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) and de-risking the site for construction. The construction phase of the berth has commenced, with the excavation of more than 18,000 cubic metres of material, which will form the 280-metre-long tunnel that will carry electrical, water, communications and air services vital to the nuclear safety and maintenance of berthed submarines. The berth wall will be formed from a series of precast concrete reinforced sections secured by rock anchor to provide the required stability; as a precursor to this work four trial anchors are currently under construction. Progress against 10 dock refurbishment includes trial build activity and the fabrication of a dockyard concrete batching plant, which will support the pace required during main dock construction. Significant volumes of concrete were also poured in the Spring this year, the biggest single pour in 20 years at the dockyard, to form the base of the caisson which seals the dock. The next phase of caisson construction activity is due to commence in the coming days.

With reference to page 128 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on aligning (a) architecture and (b) standards with the (i) defence-wide digital network, (ii) platforms and (iii) services held at above secret.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) does not comment on the detail of networks operating at Secret or above for reasons of national security. While the Strategic Defence Review 2025 outlines our ambition to align architecture and standards across defence digital capabilities, it would be inappropriate to disclose specific progress or integration details relating to Secret and Above Secret systems, platforms or services. In terms of standards, Defence Developer Services (D2S) is a containerised platform hosted on MODCloud which can be used to build, test, and deploy applications that can be a mix of own code, open-source and off-the-shelf solutions.

With reference to recommendation 55 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on establishing a government-wide review of handling processes for intelligence material.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given by my hon. Friend the Minister of State (Minister for Defence Readiness and Industry) on 6 September 2025 to question 70782.

With reference to page 79 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what steps he is taking to uphold the Antarctic Treaty system.

Defence plays an important role in safeguarding UK interests in Antarctica, including the British Antarctic Territory and supporting UK roles and responsibilities to the Antarctic Treaty. The Royal Navy’s Ice Patrol Ship, HMS PROTECTOR, routinely deploys to the Antarctic Peninsula. Activities include: undertaking hydrographic surveys to improve the safety of navigation; facilitating inspections under the Antarctic Treaty; and assistance to the British Antarctic Survey and UK Antarctic Heritage Trust. RAF transport aircraft periodically deliver logistics to British Antarctic Survey through airdrops. The MOD is supporting the FCDO’s work to publish a UK Antarctic strategy by the end of the year, which will set the Government’s aims and ambitions for Antarctica for the next 10 years.

With reference to page 71 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, published on 8 July 2025, what recent progress he has made on exploring options to support home ownership by service personnel.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) remains committed to supporting home ownership amongst Service personnel, and through the Forces Help to Buy (FHTB) Scheme, has already supported thousands of personnel, and their families, to get on the property ladder. The Scheme has been intentionally designed to work with the inherent mobility of Service and already supports personnel transferring the outstanding FHTB balance to a new qualifying property on assignment, along with financial support for the legal costs of moving house. It also permits personnel to let out their property after an initial qualifying period when assigned to a location too far away to commute on a daily basis. FHTB enables Service personnel to borrow up to 50 per cent of their salary, up to a maximum of £25,000 interest-free, towards the purchase of a property. As the FHTB is a loan scheme, it is essentially self-funding, meaning that payments are funded from repayments. With regards to the Strategic Defence Review, Defence is still considering options to further support home ownership, in addition to potential enhancements to the FHTB scheme.

With reference to page 91 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on mapping reservists’ (a) locations and (b) skills.

In support of the Strategic Defence Review recommendation to step-up engagement with the Strategic Reserve, the Military Strategic Headquarters, in partnership with the Military Commands, is leading work to gather and assure the relevant information on ex-Regular Service personnel who still hold a Strategic Reserve liability. This includes gathering updated contact and location details, and in future, skills information. We are improving our assurance of this information, such as through the UK exercise programme in coming years.

With reference to Box 12 page 15 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, updated on 8 July 2025, how do mission bays facilitate (a) rapid upgrades and (b) spiral development.

The Royal Navy has embraced the mission bay concept, which are spaces on our ships into which modular capabilities can be inserted quickly, easily and at very low cost. Mission bays offer the opportunity to support a standardised footprint capability module (be this a ‘pod’ or otherwise). This supports spiral development by narrowing the boundary (or scope) of any developments to this footprint, relying upon the initial standardisation specification. Therefore, rapid upgrades can be embedded within the platform through the much shorter route of exchanging the podded or modular component, rather than engaging in constructive re-design of a system already integrated into the platform.

What progress he has made on dismantling HMS Swiftsure.

To date almost 550 tonnes of conventional waste have been removed and recycled from Swiftsure, with 90% of her total weight expected to be recycled in due course. In June 2025, Swiftsure’s fin was cut and removed, marking a key project milestone. This unique project is providing a safe, environmentally responsible and cost-effective solution for the recycling of the UK’s decommissioned nuclear fleet and supports 200 highly-skilled jobs in Rosyth.

With reference to page 117 of the Strategic Defence Review, published on 2 June 2025, what progress he he made on building on UK membership of (a) minilateral groupings and (b) the Combined Space Operations initiative to help ensure that NATO has an effective space policy.

The United Kingdom remains firmly committed to collaborating with international partners and allies through a range of fora, including the Combined Space Operations (CSpO) initiative. Through these partnerships, we are building a shared understanding of evolving space threats, integrating space more effectively into defence operations, and pursuing interoperability and resilience across our defence space capabilities. As NATO continues to implement its space policy, the United Kingdom is actively contributing to these efforts by leveraging the expertise and insights gained through wider collaboration with international partners, many of whom are also NATO members. In doing so, the United Kingdom helps to shape discussions and drive progress on NATO’s space policy, strengthening the Alliance’s ability to address emerging challenges in an increasingly contested space environment.

With reference to page 120 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on fusing CyberEM activity in pursuit of (a) sovereign and (b) NATO operations.

The Ministry of Defence works closely with allies and partners on shared mission sets in preparing for future operational scenarios. The newly established 2 star Defence Cyber and Electromagnetic Force (within Cyber and Specialist Operations Command) will drive the fusion of these efforts, with a particular emphasis on electromagnetic operations. This approach aims to ensure that insights from the Ukraine conflict are applied to both present and future sovereign and NATO strategy development and operational planning.

With reference to page 22 of the National Security Strategy 2025, CP 1338, published on 24 June 2025, what the composition is of the Joint Expeditionary Force.

The Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) is a coalition of ten like-minded NATO nations: Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the UK, which acts as Framework Nation. The JEF is a high-readiness multinational defence framework designed to respond rapidly to crises, particularly in the High North, North Atlantic, and the Baltic Sea Region. It operates flexibly, with no standing force elements, instead drawing national contributions on a case-by-case basis.

With reference to the data tables accompanying the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority Annual Report 2024-25, published on 11 August 2025, what assessment he has made of the feasibility of participating in the Beyond Visual Range Air-to-Air Missile export market.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD), working closely with MBDA UK and the Meteor partner nations, supports the export of the Meteor Beyond Visual Range Air to Air Missile which is a strategically important capability manufactured and assembled in the UK. Currently, Meteor is integrated on the Eurofighter Typhoon, Gripen and Rafale combat air platforms and is operated by/on contract with 14 countries including the UK. The UK and Italy are working to integrate Meteor on F-35, which will be the most widely procured combat air platform in history. Additionally, the MOD is playing a key role in supporting Republic of Korea’s integration of Meteor on to its KF-21 aircraft. This resulted in a significant export sale of Meteor in 2023. All future UK BVRAAM development will be conducted with exportability as a fundamental requirement.

With reference to page 88 of the Strategic Defence Review 2025, what progress he has made on organising public engagement days.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 8 September 2025 to Question 70737 to the hon. Member for South Suffolk (Mr James Cartlidge).