Member's statement: Thales Belfast: Defence Spending

Member's statement by Mr Gerry Carroll on 10 March 2025.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

10 March 2025

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

Thales Belfast: Defence Spending

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4840823

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Last week, a £1·6 billion deal with Thales for 5,000 air-defence missiles was announced. The deal will involve the creation of 200 new jobs —

— and the opening of a third Thales site in the North. The contract will be funded by a deal that is underwritten by UK Export Finance. Last October, the UK Government announced that UK Export Finance:

"can now provide financial support for overseas projects that source critical minerals for use in major UK industries."

There you have it. Invest NI has handed over more than £14 million of taxpayers' money to Thales, which —

— is a company that is owned by French billionaires. The Members to my right hesitate to talk about that. The deal is not about creating jobs in the North or bolstering Ukraine's defence against Russia but about the control of natural resources and the siphoning of billions of pounds of money from the public purse into the pockets of billionaires. On top of that, Keir Starmer has determined that he will increase defence spending by more than £6 billion a year.

The Members to my right may not like to hear this, but, with £6 billion, we could abolish the two-child limit, reinstate the winter fuel payment and have £1·5 billion left to spare, yet the UK Government say that money is not available to do that. That £6 billion could alternatively pay for 26,000 nurses, 1,000 new ambulances or 28,000 social homes. There are no cheers to my right for that. People in east Belfast and across the North do not want boots on the ground and planes in the air. Rather, they want a social security system that they can rely on when they need it. They want safe, secure and affordable homes, access to the NHS for their kids, and for their kids to be taught in schools that are not crumbling around them. There are also questions for the Minister for the Economy to answer. What about the 'good jobs' agenda? Do good jobs involve the manufacture of weapons of war? Are those classified as good jobs? There are massive questions to be asked about a deal to create 200 new jobs in an arms company in a so-called post-conflict society. People who work in weapons manufacturing could quite easily transition to working in green and renewable energy jobs such as wind turbine technology, solar panel installation and energy storage. Where are the 200 jobs in green and renewable energy that would help meet the net zero targets and avoid literal climate breakdown? Instead of creating such jobs, Keir Starmer and others are pouring fuel on the fire of imperialist competition in Europe. Polling suggests that the people of Ukraine want a ceasefire. We are always told that there is no money for the poor, but that deal shows us that, once again, there is always enough money for war. It is no coincidence that, at the same time as Keir Starmer has found billions of pounds for war, his Government are set on a new round of cutbacks to welfare —

— and a further tax on our public services. It is time to stand up —

— and time to fight back.

539 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:02 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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