Speeches by Pollard.

“I asked for written confirmation. I have received written confirmation from the Chief of the General Staff and the national armaments director who was in place at the time. That note to me set out very clearly, “The objectively gathered evidence shows Ajax is demonstrably safe to operate”. Based on that evidence, I fel…”

“I want to see what the results are, but I share the general concern I think you are raising. I want to make sure that all advice given to Ministers, myself included, is timely and accurate.”

“Absolutely, yes. I know I am going back to this, but we do not yet know the cause of what happened to those vehicles that has created the problems that our soldiers have experienced. I want to get on top of what the actual problem was. Was it a maintenance issue? Was it a design problem? Was it an issue with the platfo…”

“There will be three investigations into it. The Defence Accident Investigation Branch will publish in the usual way, but I will set expectations that that will probably take some time because it will want to be thorough, and we would expect it to be thorough. The British Army’s investigation is the preliminary findings…”

“I expect everyone in the MoD, be they in uniform or in civilian roles, to be providing good, accurate and timely advice. I expect that on the Ajax programme, just as much as I expect it on anything to do with AUKUS that we will discuss shortly. Once we have seen what the preliminary results are into what happened on Ex…”

“Until I see the findings of the preliminary report into what happened, I do not want to make a judgment as to the process that led up to it, because I want to see what happened in the first instance. It is very clear in the direction that we have given within the Department that safety is our top priority. We would not…”

“I will undertake the usual scrubbing to make sure it is appropriate, but I am happy to share that with the Committee.”

“Yes.”

“I am grateful for the time that my hon. Friend spent talking to me about SME potential in Dudley and across the west midlands last week. There is a huge opportunity to direct more of the increasing defence budget at British firms, and in particular SMEs. There is huge potential with the skills base in the west midlands…”

“The role of west midlands SMEs in support of our armed forces is vital for our national security. The Ministry of Defence has just published our regional breakdown of defence spending in the west midlands, where we spend £1.7 billion. That is the highest on record, supporting 7,900 jobs, but it is not enough. We will s…”

“Keeping our nation safe in the air, on land and at sea requires cyber and space capabilities. Defence was attacked 90,000 times in the cyber domain, which amounts to roughly 250 attacks a day. That is why we are investing not just in the National Cyber Force but in the defence cyber and electromagnetic force that we ar…”

“As a fellow south-west MP, I know just how important it is for us to invest in defence skills in the south-west and across the United Kingdom. The defence industrial strategy includes the £182 million package that we will deliver via defence technical excellence colleges with our colleagues in the Department for Educat…”

“As we move towards warfighting readiness, the Government are investing more of our rising defence budget in new technologies and innovation, and the need for more innovative solutions to address emerging challenges is paramount in these darker and more dangerous times. On 1 July we launched UK Defence Innovation, a £40…”

“I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising the important role that universities play. In the defence industrial strategy, published a few months ago, we set out our ambition to create a defence universities alliance, bringing together the very best cutting-edge research that is being done in our universities…”

“I agree with the hon. Gentleman’s critique of the system that we inherited from the previous Government, which frankly was not good enough. We do need to see procurement contracting times reduced, which is why in the defence industrial strategy we set out our ambition to reduce six-year procurements to two years, two-y…”

“I thank the hon. Gentleman for the tone in which he spoke to the nation about the attack that took place in his constituency. He should feel very proud of the first responders from his area who responded to that attack. As for the opportunities that exist in his constituency, I was very pleased to meet him and my hon. …”

“I thank the hon. Lady for raising the opportunities in the south-west. There is a huge skilled workforce in the south-west region and a huge amount of economic activity already present, but we want there to be even more. That is why we are working with local government, and with regional government where it exists, acr…”

“I thank my constituency neighbour for raising issues involving the south-west. I am actually opening that factory in the hon. Member’s constituency next week, and I look forward to seeing her there to make the case further for it. The defence investment plan, which will be published later this year, will set out what w…”

“We want to direct more of our increasing defence budget at British companies, including small and medium-sized enterprises. I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend to see how we can encourage her business to win more defence contracts and to feed back on how we can be better in allowing SMEs to access the defence fundi…”

“As a very proud Labour and Co-operative MP, I know just how important it is to use community energy to create good renewable energy and cut energy bills. I would be very happy to speak to my hon. Friend about that. We are looking at the 1% of Britain that we own as a Department to see how we can not only deliver defenc…”