Meeting of the Parliament 18 June 2025
Scotland’s defence sector, which covers aerospace, defence and security, is valued at £3.2 billion and directly supports more than 33,000 jobs. I acknowledge the sector’s importance, although I believe that it should, over time, diversify towards commercial activities, ensuring that Scotland remains a hub for manufacturing and innovation. However, what I cannot accept is that parts of Scotland’s defence industry are manufacturing components such as systems for the Paveway smart bombs that are used by the Israeli air force in Gaza.
A 2021 investigation by The Ferret website revealed that Scottish defence companies have supplied components for Israel’s F-16 and F-35 aircraft, rocket systems and engines for G550 surveillance aircraft, all of which are likely to have been deployed over Gaza. Over the past decade, the UK Government has licensed hundreds of millions of pounds in arms exports to Israel, including bombs, drones, grenades, small arms, tanks and missiles.
Despite public pressure, the UK Labour Government has suspended fewer than 10 per cent of arms export licences to Israel. I urge the UK Government to halt all defence-related export licences to Israel until the killing of Palestinians stops.
What is happening in Palestine reminds me of how, from 1974 to 1978, the workers at the Rolls-Royce factory in East Kilbride refused to work on Chilean air force plane parts because of the atrocities that were being committed by the Pinochet dictatorship. That boycott—a powerful act of solidarity with the people of Chile—grounded half of Chile’s air force, as the film “Nae Pasaran” documents. It is time that trade unions across the UK took a similar stance to those East Kilbride workers 50 years ago in order to stop the genocide that is being committed by Israel.
Defence is an important sector, but it is important to recognise the size of the industry, as it accounts for just over 2 per cent of Scotland’s economy, as measured by gross value added, and is worth 5 per cent of the UK’s £62 billion defence budget. Thankfully, Scotland’s economy is diverse and resilient, and non-defence sectors drive nearly 98 per cent of GVA. All key parts of Scotland’s economy—land use, energy, construction and non-defence manufacturing—are worth more than, or equal, the defence sector’s contribution.
As with most parts of the UK, Scotland’s economy depends on the service sector. Individual sectors—such as information and communications; finance and insurance; professional, scientific and technical research; tourism and hospitality; retail and wholesaling; real estate; health; and education—are worth more to the Scottish economy than the defence sector is when it comes to GVA. I welcome the support that the Scottish Government provides in order to encourage that continued diversity. I also welcome the fact that, since it was first elected, the Scottish Government has invested £45 million in companies that are involved in defence contracts.
The motion refers to a Scottish Enterprise grant that was not awarded to Rolls-Royce to support
“specialist naval welding”
training
“for submarine construction”.
However, it overlooks the fact that most expenditure and work on the nuclear submarines will occur in Barrow-in-Furness in north-west England. It also fails to note the Scottish Government’s £2 million investment in engineering skills in the Glasgow city region, which was developed by the Clyde maritime cluster in partnership with Skills Development Scotland. I question why Rolls-Royce Holdings, which has a turnover of £18.9 billion and £2.5 billion in net profit, requires public funding of £2.5 million for a skills centre to fulfil its contracts.
16:37