My ride in a helicopter over London as Leonardo expands its UK presence Business Helicopter travel is the preserve of London’s elite: Celebrities, billionaires and high flying – if you’ll pardon the pun – City chief executives. Leonardo attracted headlines earlier this year when it secured a £1bn contract to build helicopters for the Ministry of Defence. The company had warned it could shut its UK helicopter manufacturing facility [...]
Exclusive: Ajax tank maker handed £12m from MoD despite trial pause Industrials The company behind the failed Ajax tank was paid more than £12m in the period trials were paused, City AM can reveal, laying bare the scale of dysfunction inside national defence procurement. General Dynamics continued to receive taxpayer cash in the period between late November and this week, the time where the government intervened to [...]
14 charts reveal the massive challenges facing UK and NATO defence spending Politics Defence spending is casting a shadow over Downing Street. Military officers are in a state of despair. The choices facing Sir Keir Starmer are stark. The political calculus for the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has become more complicated than ever as the Iran war puts public finances in danger. Their difficulties go back to February 2025 [...]
MoD looks to hire AI chief on £185,000 – just don’t use it in your application March 23, 2026 The Ministry of Defence is on the search for a new AI chief to put the UK on a tech war footing. The MoD said its new chief AI officer would be in charge of leading an in-house technology centre and bringing AI into operation across the military for “maximum impact”. The London-based job will [...]
Mark Kleinman: £1bn Leonardo deal betrays Whitehall toxicity March 5, 2026 Mark Kleinman is Sky News’ City Editor and the man who gets the Square Mile talking in his weekly City AM column How’s this for joined-up government? The chancellor, could not bear to let 3,000 skilled manufacturing jobs at a helicopter factory in Somerset evaporate – or so the story went – because “Rachel cares about keeping the [...]
New body to run military housing in Ministry of Defence overhaul November 3, 2025 Ministers are set to create a new quango to run military housing after concluding the Ministry of Defence was not up to the job. The new Defence Housing Service, to be announced by Defence Secretary John Healey on Monday, will take over management of service accommodation after years of complaints about poor quality homes. It [...]
Defence training to be ramped up to ‘wartime pace’ in new strategy September 6, 2025 Defence training will be ramped up to a “wartime pace” in a new education drive aimed at growing the UK’s skilled workforce, the Government has said. Under the plans, five new “technical excellence colleges” will be set up across the country as well as targeted short courses and Stem schemes for school students to pursue [...]
Serco: Defence spending pushes order pipeline to 10-year high August 7, 2025 Government services firm Serco’s order pipeline has risen to the highest in more than a decade as countries across Europe and North America ramp up their defence budgets. The firm’s pipeline stood at £11.9bn, up six per cent compared to the end of last year, with as much as 80 per cent of its order [...]
Rachel Reeves’ matchmaker moment July 23, 2025 Finance bros and gals are often seen oozing confidence as they strut their stuff around the streets of the City of London, imagining they’re the main characters on hit show Industry. But it would be a mistake to assume these investor strategists, expert consultants and risk analysts are libertarian dreamers, swashbuckling Reagan fanatics and small-state [...]
Exclusive: Ministry of Defence fends off fake invoices in battle against fraudsters July 22, 2025 The Ministry of Defence has dismissed more than a thousand invoices in each of the last three years in a warning sign that fraudsters are targeting government services. A Freedom of Information request has unveiled the extent of invoices given the red flag by the government and their total value. These can include claims for [...]