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Sir Keir Starmer has praised a trilateral programme to build a sixth-generation fighter jet as “important” and making “significant progress”, but stopped short of confirming that Britain’s participation in it would not be scaled back.
The UK prime minister declared on Monday that the Global Combat Air Programme, on which the UK is collaborating with Italy and Japan, offered “significant benefits here in this country”.
However, Starmer also noted that “there is, of course, a review going on” into the UK’s defence and declined to stamp out suggestions — stemming from a media report last week — that the jet programme could be axed on the grounds of cost.
Appearing at the Farnborough International Airshow in Hampshire, an aerospace, aviation and defence trade exhibition that takes place every two years, Starmer said of GCAP: “It is an important programme and I know that people in the room will want to hear me say that. It’s a programme on which we’re making significant progress in my view.”
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds was more explicit in his support, saying that the government was “very strongly committed” to the programme.
“We see it as essential for the future, not just in terms of our defence but also our industrial needs,” he told reporters at the show.
The sector, he added, is a “huge example of the kind of industrial strategy that we want to see across a wider percentage of the economy where you have a genuine collaboration between the private sector and government”.
Britain’s biggest defence companies, BAE Systems and Rolls-Royce, are working together alongside industrial partners Leonardo of Italy and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries from Japan on the programme, which aims to have a new generation aircraft flying by 2035.
Herman Claesen, BAE’s managing director for GCAP, told reporters on Monday that the partners were working towards the launch of the design and development phase of the project next year. The UK government has committed just over £2bn towards the original Tempest programme alone but will need to invest significantly more to make it a reality.
Defence industry executives have privately played down the likelihood of the government cancelling the programme, which is underpinned by a trilateral treaty between the three partner nations, but conceded that it was important to keep “making the case”.
“The review has made us realise that we need to keep making the case for this programme,” said one, noting that there would be competition for resources between forces.
John Healey, his newly appointed defence secretary, is due to hold a ministerial level meeting about the platform at Farnborough on Tuesday.
Speaking separately at the show, Roberto Cingolani, chief executive of Italy’s defence champion Leonardo, said it made sense for the government to wait until the end of its review before committing to the programme.
“I believe that the basic idea is that, correctly, the UK government wants to see the outcome of the spending review and depending on that will decide what next,” Cingolani told the Financial Times.
Were the UK to decide to reduce the funding, that would “very likely change the balance within the consortium” and could make room for “other partners” he said but added that he was “not concerned”.