A parliamentary defence committee has warned the UK does not have an adequate plan to defend itself from military attack and is overly dependent on US capabilities. In a strongly critical report, the committee said preparations to protect the UK and its overseas territories in the event of attack are “nowhere near” where they need to be.
Committee chair, Labour MP Tan Dhesi, pointed to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, continuing disinformation campaigns and repeated airspace incursions across Europe as evidence that the UK cannot ignore the threat. The committee urged the government to assess where British forces could replace US capabilities if they were withdrawn, to accelerate industrial change, and to make readiness the top priority.
Defence Secretary John Healey has set out plans to move the UK to “war-fighting readiness,” including a £1.5bn package to support construction of new munitions factories by private contractors. The government says it wants an “always on” munitions production capacity that can be scaled quickly, and to restart domestic production of energetics (explosives, pyrotechnics and propellants) after roughly two decades of relying on overseas suppliers. Healey says the programme will create at least 1,000 new jobs and hopes at least six new factories will be operational by the next general election in 2029, with work on the first sites beginning next year.
The Ministry of Defence has shortlisted 13 potential sites for new factories: three in Scotland (Dumfriesshire, Ayrshire, Grangemouth/Stirlingshire); eight in England (Teesside, Cumbria, Shropshire, Cheshire, Derbyshire, Essex, Worcestershire, Hampshire); and two in Wales (Monmouthshire and Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire). Healey will also announce plans for two new drone factories in Plymouth and Swindon. He is pitching the industrial push as a way to make defence an engine for growth, backing British jobs and skills while strengthening national and economic security.
Although the government previously committed to raise defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2034 at the latest, the committee warns that the UK and its European NATO allies still rely too heavily on the United States and are not investing enough in their own defences. The report calls for urgent strengthening of conventional and nuclear capabilities and for improved joint working with NATO partners.
The committee was also critical of the slow pace of improvements to civil defence and resilience, saying the UK risks failing to meet NATO Article 3 obligations to maintain and develop capacity to resist armed attack. It wants the government to do more to communicate clearly to the public about the level of threat and what to expect in the event of conflict, arguing that whole-of-society support is crucial to national defence.