Mr Mark Francois

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher, as we debate the important role that the Typhoon programme plays in our nation’s defence and industrial strength. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mr Snowden) on securing this important debate. Since he entered the House almost a year and a half ago, he has proved a doughty champion for his constituents, for the defence industry in the north-west more generally and for his constituents at Warton for whom the Typhoon programme is crucial in particular. He made a very good speech to open the debate, and I know that he will continue to fight tenaciously for his constituents’ interests as this Parliament plays out. I also take the opportunity to pay a personal thank you related to air defence. Recently, I turned 60 and, as a memorable birthday present, my local Conservative Association generously clubbed together to pay for a 30-minute, two-seater Spitfire flight in aircraft No. MT818 out of Biggin Hill, including overflying my constituency. I warmly thank the pilot, Barry, and all his colleagues at FlyASpitfire.com—who do what it says on the tin—for a wonderful day. At this time of remembrance, it brought home to me just how brave the few—some of whom had barely 10 hours on type—were in flying that iconic aircraft in mortal combat during the battle of Britain. I am deeply grateful for that truly unforgettable experience. It will literally live with me for the rest of my life. Returning to the present, I also congratulate the Minister on the fact that the Government have now sealed the deal to export some 20 Typhoons to Turkey. For the record, my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge), when he was the Minister with responsibility for procurement, spent a considerable amount of time promoting that deal, as did Ben Wallace, the then Secretary of State. Nevertheless, it would be churlish not to say well done to the Government for capitalising on those previous efforts and bringing the arrangement to fruition. That being so, I have some specific questions about the deal for the Minister which I hope that the House will welcome. First, can he confirm what tranche of Typhoon the new aircraft will be, including what variant of radar it will carry? That has implications not just for BAE Systems at Warton, but for our national radar manufacturer Leonardo, based in Edinburgh. As for MBDA, our missiles champion, is the Meteor missile also part of the sale to Turkey? Secondly, a suggestion has been that Qatar will sell its older Typhoons to Turkey as part of the arrangement and that that might yet lead, in turn, to further Typhoon orders at Warton. Is that the case and, if so, what can the Minister tell us? Thirdly, is the Minister able to say anything more about other potential Typhoon sales internationally, in particular to Poland or Saudi Arabia? A Typhoon order from Saudi would be a significant achievement and, indeed, negotiations to that effect have been under way for several years already. That, too, would be of great interest to the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde, so I wonder whether the Minister is in a position to say anything further about that this morning. As the debate is entitled “Typhoon Fighter Sovereign Capability”, I also take this opportunity to press the Minister on the future of the Typhoon in Royal Air Force service. The RAF has recently retired some 30 of the older tranche 1 Typhoons, and has been in the process of effectively cannibalising them in order to keep the more modern tranche 2 and tranche 3 aircraft flying. In terms of combat mass, that represents a worrying reduction of about a fifth of the entire RAF Typhoon fleet. The few remaining tranche 1s in service are now the fleet of Typhoons based at RAF Mount Pleasant. Will the Minister confirm that when they retire some time in 2026-27, the RAF will provide replacements of either tranche 2 or tranche 3 aircraft to maintain the air defence of the Falkland Islands, not least for the peace of mind of the Falkland Islands Government? That would leave about 107 tranche 2 and 3 aircraft in RAF service. The tranche 3 aircraft are optimised to accept the new future generation of electronically scanned radar, now generally referred to as Radar 2, which has been under development at Leonardo in Edinburgh, in association with other European allies, for more than a decade. Tranche 2 aircraft can also be modified to accept Radar 2, but both tranches of aircraft require an important electronics update, known as P4E, in order to fully utilise the important new capability of Radar 2, including its crucial electronic warfare suite. However, as I understand it, the MOD has still not placed an order for the final development and installation of P4E, crucial though it is to Typhoon’s future. Although Radar 2 has now been fully developed—indeed, I was privileged to see a prototype of it on a shadow ministerial visit to Leonardo some months ago—the MOD has still not placed a production order even for an initial batch of Radar 2s. That too represents a very important part of the UK’s Typhoon sovereign capability. Without an effective radar, much of the other investment in Typhoon is nugatory. Can the Minister say anything positive today about the future orders for Radar 2 and the associated P4E upgrade to the UK Typhoon programme, given that both—and we need both—are due to be in operational service by 2030? BAE trade union colleagues, whom I met recently at Samlesbury, have been pushing hard for a further domestic order of Typhoon aircraft, not least to maintain key skills at the Warton site. They have no greater champion than my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde—“Tory MP backs trade unions to the hilt”. I appreciate that that is not an easy decision for Ministers to take, and that it must be considered in the context of the wider mix of potential combat air system, as several hon. Members have said. In that regard, to date the UK has ordered some 48 F-35B short take-off and vertical landing variants for both the Fleet Air Arm and the Royal Air Force, almost 40 of which have now been delivered—minus one, which had an unfortunate accident leaving an aircraft carrier. However, both the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have been highly critical of the slow build-up of the Lightning force. Can the Minister say anything more encouraging about that? The Government have intimated that they intend to buy another 26 F-35Bs, making 74 in total out of an originally planned order of 138. However, this summer they announced their intention to substitute 12 of those aircraft for the F-35A variant, which is capable of carrying the B61 tactical nuclear weapon, both in our defence of the United Kingdom and as part of our commitment to NATO. What more can the Minister tell us about how many F-35s the MOD still intends to buy, and what mix of variants that will comprise, in addition to Typhoon? A crucial future part of our sovereign air capability is represented by the global combat air programme, which aims to develop a world-class, sixth-generation combat aircraft—a system of systems, potentially including autonomous adjuncts. It is being built with Italy and Japan, and is to be known in RAF service as the Tempest. As the Minister knows, the putative initial operational capability for GCAP is 2035, partly driven by a very hard in-service date for the Japanese air force. An industrial consortium called Edgewing, headquartered in Reading, has recently been formed to manufacture the aircraft, but there are already worrying rumours of delays. Will the Minister take the opportunity today to confirm that GCAP/Tempest remains on schedule, and that Tempest will still succeed our oldest remaining tranche 2 Typhoons from 2035? The Typhoon is a fundamentally important part of the air defence of the United Kingdom and of our allies, and is likely to remain so for decades, even allowing for the gradual introduction of Tempest. As the Minister will appreciate, for those aircraft to be used most effectively, especially in the air defence role, they need to be closely integrated into the UK’s wider air defence network. We now have a major gap in that capability, however, following the withdrawal of the Boeing E-3D AWACS aircraft in 2021, because of the frustratingly delayed introduction into service of its vital replacement the Boeing E-7 Wedgetail. The delays to Wedgetail are a disgrace; the aircraft is years late and has flown only a relatively small number of test flights. Rumours are circulating within the industry that this is due to a mixture of factors, including the integration of the MESA—multi-role electronically scanned array—radar and serious problems with the UK E-7’s bespoke command and battle management system. A respected former procurement Minister, Sir Jeremy Quin, was recently appointed chairman of Boeing UK. I hope he can bring his experience to bear to sort out this debacle. What can the Minister say today about Wedgetail and when it is finally likely to enter operational service with the Royal Air Force? In short, when will the aircraft be ready to fight, rather than just conduct air displays as it did at the Royal International Air Tattoo this summer? We await the Government’s long-promised defence investment plan, including details on the future of Typhoon. We were originally promised the DIP by the autumn. With the leaves already turning, I ask the Minister a straight question: is Christmas in the autumn? Can he guarantee that the DIP will be published in full by the time the House rises for the Christmas recess on 18 December, just over a month from now? In addition, can the Minister assure us that the DIP will contain a similar level of granularity to the previous, well-established equipment plans that were published annually under Conservative Governments? They gave a considerable amount of detail so that the defence industry had a fighting chance of planning. The Minister will know that a bunch of major programmes are awaiting their fate with the publication of the DIP, including the phase 4 enhancement and mark 2 radar, the new medium helicopter and the wider combat air mix referred to earlier. After all this time, yet another Ministry of Defence policy document, with a bunch of glossy photos but not much detail, will not suffice. Perhaps the Minister can provide some reassurance this morning. Finally, can the Minister guarantee to deliver the DIP, including for Typhoon, given that the MOD is now embroiled in a massive in-year cost-saving exercise, including efficiencies—spending cuts, in pub English—of £2.5 billion in 2025-26 alone? That is happening this financial year, right now; if that is not true, I will give way briefly to the Minister to deny it. Silence speaks volumes. I will finish by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde on securing this important debate. I hope that we will get clear answers to the straightforward questions that he and I and others have put to the Minister this morning. Typhoon is vital to our future, and we all want to know what will happen to it.