Defence

The Defence Industry in the wake of the Second World War was huge. A country that had been at war for ten years out of the previous thirty five was bound to have a significant defence establishment and industry.

These continued with cross party support for both conventional and nuclear weapons until, with recession, national budgets became tight in the seventies. The watchword was technical sophistication and this was expensive.

The industry, which had been dominated by shipbuilders, motor companies and aircraft manufacturers, became much more dependent on electronics companies such as Marconi, Ferranti, Plessey and GEC.

A defence industry is dependent on government buying and in recent years this has re-established itself. It is also dependent on exports and BAE Systems has been effective in this. More recently cross border collaboration, in spite of Brexit, has re-emerged.

The image is of the Old Dalby depot which was a Central Ordnance depot in WW2 and then became a REME centre of excellence in electronics including missile systems. I tell more in a talk I gave.