Ministry Of Defence
Good afternoon everybody. Im delighted to see you all here because I wasnt sure whether anyone was going to turn up. Particularly delighted to see Chief of the Defence Staff in the front seat in case I get some difficult questions, so thank you for the help later, Tony.
Let me start by talking about the threat. I think its clear to me that we live in incredibly challenging times. Probably the most challenging times in my working career. We obviously have a hot war in Europe. We have a return to state-on-state competition. We still have the ongoing aftershocks of COVID and global pandemic and terrorism and grey-zone conflict have not gone away.
And yet, as we work together, to try to protect our nations and help them prosper, I think there is real reason for optimism if you look at the pace of change of what together, were all delivering.
Im going to start by talking about what we have delivered over the last year together. And I think that really emphasises just how much pace there is going on right now. And then were going to talk about what we also did over the last year to set us up for the future.
And as John just talked about, Im going to try and do that from a number of different perspectives from my role as Chief Executive of DE&S, of course, but also from my role as National Armaments Director and a member of the Defence Senior Leadership Team.
So what did we deliver in the last year? Well, we have to start by talking about Ukraine. The Ukraine conflict is clearly a human tragedy. Its a tragedy for the nation. Its also a tragedy that we have a hot war in Europe.
And clearly, its really important that we continue to work together to support the people of Ukraine to make sure that we end up with a result that we all think is the right one. But there is real reason for optimism around Ukraine, particularly because what weve seen is over 50 nations through the Ukraine Contact Group come together to support an ally to sustain the international rule of law. That is incredibly encouraging.
The UK has played a really significant part in that support. In fact, were the second largest nation in terms of the support that weve been giving. And weve been delivering at incredible pace. My organisation were able to get the first orders out in support of Ukraine within 48 hours. Collectively as UK Defence, we gave 2.3 billion worth of support and training and capability last year, as well as helping to coordinate just short of three quarters of a billion pounds worth of funding through the International Fund for Ukraine that we helped facilitate and bring together the support of many smaller nations. Thats phenomenal.
The pace of what weve delivered is really significant. Weve gifted in kind over a billion pounds worth of equipment. But even more exciting weve acquired over 1.5 billion of new capability from industry representatives, many of whom will be here at the show. Thats large companies, but also really innovative, SME-generated solutions that have been developed and tailored through the year to respond to the conflict.
That pace of innovation and change is a real reason for excitement and optimism and a real reason for you all to be proud of what youre doing. Overall, we have over 350 lines of activity supporting the Ukraine operation. And Im absolutely delighted when Deputy Minister Havrylov was able to come to Abbey Wood, to thank our teams for support that theyve given.
Im delighted that that support was recognised by the House of Commons Defence Select Committee, and Im delighted earlier on today when I was able to meet two Deputy Ministers from Ukraine who again reaffirmed just what a difference the support together we are making to Ukraines ability to sustain the fight.
Weve not just made progress at pace in Ukraine, within NATO we coordinate our activities in the acquisition and support space through the conference of National Armaments Directors, where I and representatives of every other every other part of the NATO nation work together to try to accelerate the capability and ensure it has sustainment.
That relationship is stronger than it has been for decades. And the pace with which were operating is accelerating. We have more to do. And I was delighted that we were able to announce that the Defence Production Action Plan, which will take us forward to accelerating the pace with which we standardise our equipment, with which we make sure theyre interoperable and interchangeable.
But we also look at our opportunities for bilateral and multilateral programmes that will ensure we have to sustained always-on production to ensure that we always have the resilience we need if we ever come to the fight.
When so many nations come together, it is a potent and credible deterrent against nations who wish to assert their personal benefit over that of the international rule of law.
Weve also progressed at incredible pace in the UK over the last 12 months. On top of Ukraine, the UK has been involved in operations around the world and youll have heard many of those such as Operation Polar Bear, in a number of the speeches during the week.
My team provides a vast amount of support to that ongoing operation. In the last year, weve provided over 394 million worth of fuel, 79 million worth of food, 66 million worth of clothing and equipment and 24 million worth of medicine and that just gives you an indication of the tempo at which were all operating to sustain ongoing operations.
And weve been working together to drive up the output and availability of our defence equipment and respond to the challenge that Tony laid to us. Weve seen a progressive improvement of A400M availability. And Im really pleased to see how well that platform has been operating on operations.
Together with the RAF, weve doubled the number of flying hours the Typhoon is delivering. And weve increased the maritime availability through the RENOWN programme. And you can see examples of the work done on RENOWN , both on our stand, but also on a number of supplier stands here at the show.
We havent just supplied and maintained current capability, were spinning in new technology and new capability at pace.
For example, this year weve added six more F-35 to the UK inventory. Weve put 44 AJAXs into the hands of the Army. Weve delivered the 22nd A400M, the final A400M in the UK fleet. Weve enhanced the Navy, by delivering RFA Stirling Castle and RAF Proteus. Overall, the scale of delivery is huge. Over 2,600 contracts, 550 programmes, and collectively with our industry partners, our overall performance of delivery is good.
Youll be probably surprised to know that weve deliver 98% of the key user requirements placed on us. We deliver 89% of our strategic milestones on time. Our budget performance is exceptional.
There are always programmes with challenges and there always will be. We need to work hard to reduce those challenges. And I put industry under a lot of pressure, as some of you know sitting in the room, when we fall behind. But overall, collectively, as a defence enterprise, we are really good at what we do. And our performance compared to any other sector, if you look at global international benchmarks, is outstanding. And you should be proud of what you achieve and the technical competence you have.
A real reason to be optimistic about our ability to deliver over the last 12 months. But that threat is not staying static. It is accelerating. The pace of innovation is remarkable. You can see it around you and therefore we need to accelerate the pace with which we deliver going forward.
Weve done a real effort in the UK to make sure were ready for that future. That starts at an MOD level with the Integrated Review Refresh and a restatement of our core mission.
I think a bit of brilliant simplification by the defence quad, boiling it down to two words, protect and prosper. Thats what we all do. We all help protect our nations and we help them prosper because without safety and security, our nations cannot thrive. And therefore our mission as we get up every day could not be more important.
That mission has flowed down into the detail, by producing the Defence Command Paper Refresh. That DCPR that was released in June is a thoroughly good read. And I really commend it to you. In that document, you dont find some of the really sort of flashy high-profile announcements of lots of new platforms. But what you do see is a fundamental shift in strategic thinking.
One that moves us to thinking about a long term sustained campaigning approach to the way that we operate in defence. One that is absolutely committed to delivering at pace and one that is permitted to shifting to recognise we will fight with our partners, and therefore we must be integrated with our allies from the outset. And those allies and partners include all of you here at the show.
I was delighted to see that the DCPR emphasised just how important industry is to our overall defence enterprise capability. A real recognition that our defence industrial complex is as important as our frontline soldiers, sailors, airmen and women. That is a phenomenal shift of strategic thinking.
Underpinning that is a commitment to speed and it includes things like a commitment to get from outline business case to in-service in five years, wherever possible across our core programmes, which means a real acceleration of the pace with which were operating. And were going further on top of that which Ill speak to in a moment.
To underpin the work that weve done at an MOD level, weve also strengthened the strategy for DE&S. Within the DE&S Strategy, we align our