MoD spent £34.1bn with UK industry in 2025-26, with the South East and South West taking 44%

Defence money spent with British companies is heavily concentrated in the south of England, according to figures the Ministry of Defence published on Tuesday.

The department's annual footprint report says it spent £34.1bn with UK-based industry in 2025-26, 3% more than the year before. Spread across the population, that works out at £490 per person, up £10. About £1.3bn of it went directly to small and medium-sized firms, and the department placed more than 2,000 new contracts, over 500 of them directly with smaller suppliers.

Most of the money went to three regions. The South East took £8.5bn, the South West £6.7bn and the North West £5.4bn, together about 60% of the total. On a per-head basis the South West stood out at £1,130 per resident. The region includes the helicopter works at Yeovil, the Devonport naval base in Plymouth and several large defence suppliers in Bristol. The North West, home to the Barrow submarine yard, came to £700 per person.

Rises and falls by region

Northern Ireland saw the biggest proportional increase, with spending up 63% to £464m. Of that, £201m went on weapons and ammunition and £200m on shipbuilding. Scotland rose 13% to £2.5bn, including £1.4bn on shipbuilding. The East of England rose 25% to £2.1bn and the East Midlands 21% to £2.0bn.

Three areas went backwards. London fell 20% to £2.4bn, Wales fell 12% to £1.0bn and the South West dipped 3%, though it remained the second-largest recipient.

At the other end of the table, the North East received £198m, a 6% rise but still only £70 per person. Yorkshire and the Humber took £1.1bn and the West Midlands £1.8bn.

The spending figures come from the department's regional expenditure statistics and are rounded to the nearest million, or to the nearest £0.1bn above £1bn. The MoD describes the booklet as a top-level overview rather than a full account of every supplier in each region.

Jobs and the next four years

The report puts the number of jobs in UK industry supported by MoD spending at 274,000 in 2024-25, a 10% rise. There were 132,280 regular service personnel and 52,940 MoD civil servants based in the UK at 1 April 2026.

The government has committed £298bn to defence over the next four years. Within that, the department says spending through the defence nuclear programme will be more than £20bn higher between 2026-27 and 2029-30 than in the previous four years, with its workforce expected to grow from over 47,000 to around 65,000 by 2030.

Five Defence Growth Deals, in Plymouth, South Yorkshire, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, are now live with £250m of backing over five years. The department lists economic growth as one of its three top priorities, alongside deterrence and what it calls opportunity.