Good morning everyone.
It’s a year ago that I last stood in this spot as a new Minister. Some of you will not be able to remember me because I have more grey hair than I had, certainly at this time last year.
But it was a privilege to welcome colleagues from around the world a year ago and it is a privilege to be able to do exactly the same again today.
The Secretary of State sends his apologies that he can’t be with us today – some of you may have spotted there has been some news going on in the UK over the past few days – and he continues to explain the situation that we inherited there.
But having worked alongside him in Opposition as the Shadow Minister for the Armed Forces, and now over the last year, I’ll do my best to fill his considerable shoes that he has.
But let me first begin by saying a few words about Air Chief Marshal Sir Rich Knighton, for his incredible service as the Chief of the Air Staff and now as we look ahead to his new role as Chief of the Defence Staff.
Sir Rich has served our nation with considerable distinction for 37 years.
Of the 31 individuals who have been CAS since the creation of the RAF in 1918, he has been the first non-pilot to do so, an engineer by trade.
In leading the Royal Air Force, he has upheld the highest traditions of respect, integrity and excellence, and he’s normally done so with a cheeky smile on his face as well – for those who know him.
And at a time when our recent Strategic Defence Review has heralded the beginning of a new era for UK deterrence and defence, I can think of no-one better to lead our people through the critical changes ahead.
Congratulations on your fully-deserved appointment, Rich. I look forward to carrying on working with you.
And of course, Rich’s boots are not easily filled. And so although there was a very competitive shortlist for the new Chief of the Air Staff, it was fiercely competitive, we were very fortunate to have an outstanding candidate in Air Marshal Harv Smyth.
Harv, we have urgent and important work to do as we seek to implement the Strategic Defnece Review and I’m going to look forward to continuing to work strongly with all our RAF colleagues.
And it was just a year ago, we had a General Election. It feels in Britain like there’s a lot of politics going on at the moment, and a lot of change. And that has been a year when defence has rarely been off the front pages.
From the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, to the modernisation of the UK Armed Forces set in motion, not just by the General Election, but by the Strategic Defence Review that follows.
But what the news headlines don’t always show are the efforts and the achievements of the people that stand behind the headlines that work every single day to protect our nation and our allies.
The men and women of our Armed Forces, and if I look around the room, the collective men and women of our Armed Forces, from an alliance that spans the globe of friends and allies – those men and women carry out their duties every single day with superb professionalism and precision, they go above and beyond to keep their nations, our nations, and all our partners safe, and in doing so, they not only create the environment where we can better protect our own homeland from Russian aggression, they are working to support friends and allies the world over.
The UK Armed Forces have flown over 500 sorties, for example, and moved 9 million tonnes of freight to help the people and the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
And I’m minded, at times like this, when there are so many people in uniform ahead of us, that at this very moment there are brave Ukrainian pilots in the sky above their country trying to keep Ukraine safe from Putin’s illegal aggression. There are brave men and women who I met at the INTERSTORM graduation for the training of Ukrainian pilots – many of whom were very frank and honest about their chances of survival.
That bravery is something that you all know, because it’s the bravery you see in your own people. But it is something that we, and myself as a politician, need to talk more about. Because we spend a lot of our time talking about kit and equipment and it is absolutely right – and I will do so in this speech, as a spoiler alert – but we need to talk more about our people.
Notwithstanding autonomy and uncrewed systems, we need to value the men and women who not only serve in the sky, but on the ground, in the laboratories and workshops, that keep our air forces on a global basis the incredible power that they are.
It was those brave men and women who also were active recently in the Middle East, evacuating over 220 British nationals and their dependants out of Tel Aviv, including a 3 month old baby and a 91 year old pensioner, to protect them from missile attacks.
It’s particularly important in these times of increasing insecurity that we do recognise that dedication of our people, and that is why, unapologetically, this government talks about renewing the contract between the nation and those who serve.
Everyone around the world will have a similar formulation. It may be slightly worded differently, it may be translated in a slightly different word order. But fundamentally, we need our nations to value our people more, and if we can do that we have a stronger defence by default even if we spend not a single extra penny on it. Because our people are only as strong as the nation that stands behind them.
So after awarding UK service personnel their biggest pay rise for 20 years and giving them another above inflation pay rise this year, we are delivering a generation of renewal of military accommodation, with at least £7 billion of funding for this in this parliament. For those international visitors who have not stayed in some British military accommodation for a while, let me tell you it is not good enough. That is not good enough for me, it’s not good enough for our people, and we are fixing it.
And that’s why we are going to continue to put people at the heart of our defence unapologetically.
Now, I know that the pace of change in our Armed Forces in the UK and collectively is matched by many of our international friends who are doing exactly the same.
But we are only at the start of the transformation and the RAF is at the heart of that.
The Strategic Defence Review set out our blueprint to reshape and revitalise UK defence in a new geopolitical era of threat.
Britain now has a absolutely clear NATO-first defence policy and it is pivotal to our future security.
But it is only right that Europe steps up to take on more of the heavy lifting for its own defence and protection.
At the recent Hague Summit, European leaders came together and did precisely that.
As well as a pledge to spend 5% of GDP on national security, the UK announced the biggest strengthening of our nuclear posture in a generation, including the purchase of a dozen F-35As and a commitment to join NATO’s nuclear Dual Capable Aircraft mission, giving the RAF a nuclear role for the first time since the end of the Cold War and complementing our own sovereign Continuous At Sea Deterrent which we declare, in full, to the defence of NATO.
Driving the modernisation of the RAF will be a relentless focus on innovation. For well over a century, the UK has been a leader in shaping and pioneering air power.
From the founding of the Royal Flying Corps in 1912, and the new technologies of the interwar years, radar, air defence systems, the Second World War saw air power tested and developed like never before. Yet the pace of change did not stop after the peace came.
The jet age defined deterrence in new terms, transforming speed, reach, and altitude, and while the post-Cold War era has given us precision weapons, global ISTAR and unparalleled situational awareness.
Today, we stand on the verge of another profound leap forward in which autonomy, AI, and digitisation will define the bounds of the sky. One of the key takeaways from me from the SDR is that we’re not just developing niche autonomous units at the periphery of our military. Every single unit across every single service in the UK will be moving to a system of crewed, uncrewed, and autonomous systems. That is a substantial change in not just fighting doctrine, in training, in how our people come together, in how we procure, it is a fundamental change in how we will fight and how we will deter.
We will deliver £1 billion in an integrated Targeting Web. So any sensor, any effector, any target can be struck. That is a fundamental change in how we build an integrated force, regardless of the cloth that you are wearing.
Times change, but the victors in the race to dominate air power are always those who adapt first and adapt fast.
Innovation, speed and agility, the ability to out-think, out-perform and out-manoeuvre the enemy, are the capabilities and challenges we must harness.
But let us make no mistake, our adversaries are doing exactly the same, and they are seeking to hack our phones to learn what we are doing to outpace them as well.
That means the UK and our Allies must compete harder to have control of the air and to fight in new ways.
Now I mentioned the war in Ukraine earlier, and one of the things that that is showing us is that getting new technology into the hands of warfighters fast can give you an edge on the battlefield.
It is also a central message of the new UK defence policy.
Our SDR calls for investment in Autonomous Collaborative Platforms to ensure the future of UK air combat air. And that can sound, to the voters I represent in Plymouth, a little bit like science fiction.
But making the case that that already exists, and telling the story of systems like StormShroud is vital to building the public support we need for this new era of autonomous systems as well.
StormShroud is designed to disrupt enemy radar at long range, and this fleet of new autonomous wingman drones will increase fighter jet survivability, and boost our warfighting power.
As an uncrewed system, integrated into our new digital targeting web, it also frees up personnel to perform other vital frontline missions.
And there are other ways in which StormShroud provides glimpses of the future.
As we spend more on the military in the coming years, something that as a group of friends we are all doing, Defence will increasingly become a potent engine for economic growth. An argument we must make over, and over, and over again. It is a licence to operate – Defence is an engine for growth.
StormShroud has already created hundreds of skilled jobs around the UK, with the promise of 1,000 more in the future.
And it is in contrast to the failing procurement system we inherited, StormShroud is an example of good practice.
It has gone from factory to front-line in record time, signalling how we want to streamline procurement in the future. And I suspect that the UK is not alone in wanting to make procurement faster on a global basis.
Our policy is NATO-first, but it’s not NATO-only.
The Euro-Atlantic, Indo-Pacific and Middle East are inseparably connected.
And with that, I welcome our friends from the GCAP International Government Organisation.
Through GCAP, Italy, Japan and the UK are developing a supersonic stealth fighter jet.
The programme means our nations can come together, not just to defend the Euro-Atlantic, but to support our values on a global stage. That will bring together our industrial bases, and make sure we are being able to provide the deterrence that we need well into the future.
And this time last year, just as we were kicking off the SDR, I received a lot of questions on GCAP and our position on it and a year later, I’m absolutely proud to stand on the same stage and say that GCAP is progressing well.
It already supports 3,500 UK jobs, and 1,000 apprenticeships.
Last week, we cut the ribbon on GCAP’s new headquarters in Reading, where hundreds of skilled personnel will be based, and the Defence Secretary met with counterparts from Italy and Japan to plan the next phase of this programme.
And at a time of rapidly changing technology, it’s also essential we upgrade not just those at the tip of the spear that are able to deliver kinetic effect, it’s also vital we upgrade our airborne early warning and control capabilities.
The E-7 Wedgetail will provide the improved performance we are looking for offering greater speed, range, endurance and crew capacity.
And by improving detection, it provides early warning of more challenging threats at greater distances, increasing the time available for offensive and defensive action, so boosting the lethality, survivability and resilience of our Joint Force.
Wedgetail also has a growth path to meet the expected threat over the next 20 years and beyond and for those at RIAT, look forward to seeing her in the sky above the incredible air show there.
So, to conclude.
The story of air power has always been one of constant innovation, imagination, and adaptation. That has not changed today.
But we must evolve again, to stay ahead of those who threaten our security. And that does mean moving on from some traditional doctrines and embracing the new. Embracing autonomy is a fundamental challenge for all our air forces, for all our procurement systems, for politicians who might be easier to make a case of a pilot in the sky, but by improving our lethality, by increasing it, we increase our deterrence. And with increased deterrence, we make more strategic dilemmas for those who seek to challenge the international order, who seek to challenge our freedom, and the liberty that our people enjoy.
The SDR has fired the starting pistol on that reform of the UK Armed Forces, and, having read many of the reviews undertaken by our Allies in recent months, I know similar themes are present in the new emerging defence policies that our Allies in this room are developing as well. More collaborative platforms, working together, more investment in our Armed Forces, more focus on our people. It is precisely in these ways that we will be stronger in the future, to keep not only the UK secure at home and strong abroad, but to make sure we do so in support of all our Allies as we all face similar threats from similar adversaries who fundamentally want to attack our values and our position in the world. The people in this room today have a key role in defending all those values and all our people, thank you for what you are doing. Thank you for the pace of change that you are instigating, and keep going. Thank you very much.