A Government Minister has stated the Government's push to increase defence expenditure will benefit smaller enterprises in regions such as the North East.
Armed Forces Minister Luke Pollard made the remarks during his visit to the Cook Defence Systems facility at Stanhope, County Durham, where he announced a multimillion-pound extension of the company's contract to manufacture components for º£½ÇÊÓƵ armoured vehicles. The contract will help sustain approximately 125 positions at the Stanhope facility, which is also producing components to support the Ukrainian armed forces in their conflict against Russia.
Mr Pollard's visit coincided with high-level discussions taking place in Washington DC regarding the Ukrainian war, underlining the increasingly uncertain geopolitical climate that has emerged in recent years. Earlier this year, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer committed to allocating 5% of the º£½ÇÊÓƵ's GDP to national security by 2035, reports . At the time, Sir Keir indicated that such expenditure should also benefit former industrial regions across the nation by boosting investment with º£½ÇÊÓƵ defence and engineering companies.
Following his tour of the Cook site, Mr Pollard said: "We've inherited a situation where the world is getting darker by the day. That's the reason we made a decision to increase defence spending.
"But we want defence to be an engine for growth. That means using that increased defence spending to create more, decent and well-paid jobs in every part of the country, including in the North East.
"Where we've got amazing SMEs, like Cook, that are doing something that nobody else in Britain does, we want to be backing them. That's why we're announcing a multimillion-pound contract today for the latest tracks for our advanced fighting vehicles - Challenger 3, Ajax and others - to make sure we can continue to support brilliant businesses like this.
"It's also a business that is doing the right thing, like taking on apprentices and investing in new technologies and new equipment. As we increase defence spending, I want more of that spent with British companies and more spent in particular with SMEs.
"We inherited a situation where only 4% of of the MoD's entire budget was being spent with SMEs directly. That's not enough and that's why we've made the decision that we want to increase that, and to do that, that's where the new Defence Industrial Strategy that we'll be announcing later this year will be making a clear direction to spend more with SMEs and drive growth with local economies.
"From what I've seen here today, we've got a brilliant workforce and a brilliant company that is doing something vital for our national security. These are the businesses we should be backing."
Cook Defence Systems forms part of the broader William Cook Group, which is based in Sheffield and also manufactures components for the rail, defence and energy industries. The Stanhope facility's revenue has nearly doubled to £37.2m during the past two years, primarily due to heightened expenditure by the º£½ÇÊÓƵ and its partners.
Celebrating the fresh contract, Cook Group director William Cook described the firm as a "critical British defence capability". He noted that the company's employees took immense "pride in supporting British troops and our Ukrainian allies".
He continued: "This contract is a very welcome signal that heavy armour remains core to British army planning and that companies like Cook are at the heart of the Government's forthcoming Defence Industrial Strategy."
