UK base gets £580m to fight 'biological threats'

More than half a billion pounds will be invested in a new biological defence laboratory at a UK base.

The Government has announced it will create the £580m start-of-the-art facility at Porton Down, home to the Government's Defence, Science and Technology Labs, near Amesbury in Wiltshire.

The funding is part of the Government's long-delayed Defence Investment Plan, which is due to be published in full on Tuesday.

Defence Secretary Dan Jarvis said: "The £580 million investment will create the facilities needed at Porton Down to expand their vital work, delivering for our armed forces and our national security."

The announcement comes alongside radical changes to the Royal Navy which will see all six new destroyers scrapped in favour of a scheme involving drones and autonomous weapons.

Scientists at Porton Down led the response to the Novichok nerve agent poisoning in Salisbury in 2018.

The funding for the new laboratory at Porton Down will be delivered over four years and the government said it will help expand expert UK scientists' work "on biological warfare threats".

It will be named after former British foreign secretary Ernest Bevin, one of founders of NATO.

In 2025 the government was criticised over its plan to move the UK Health Security Agency's base - along with many staff - from Porton Down to a new National Biosecurity Centre in Essex.

Jarvis added: "Our scientists and experts working at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory [Dstl] do so much, often unseen, to keep our country and our allies safe at this increasingly dangerous and unpredictable time."

Paul Hollinshead, Dstl chief executive, said: "This investment reinforces the essential work delivered daily by Dstl to protect the UK Armed Forces and defend the nation.

"As part of a broader infrastructure programme at Dstl, this new laboratory will strengthen our capacity to stay ahead of evolving biological threats and maintain the UK's leading edge in defence and security."

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