BAE has launched a new advertising campaign, its first for more than five years. The company claims that ‘It is not a knee-jerk reaction to the negative press and the SFO inquiry’. The campaign includes adverts in a selection of national and regional newspapers, ‘giant mobile poster sites’ in regions where it has a ‘significant industrial presence’ and advertising wraps on taxis in Farnborough and London.

The basic campaign image is the Union Jack, which seems a little rich considering two company trends. Firstly, BAE Systems is moving into the US as fast as it can. The number of BAE employees in the UK is steadily decreasing while the number of BAE employees in the US is rapidly increasing, overtaking the number of UK employees in 2006. BAE may happily become a US company if the opportunity arose. Secondly, BAE is increasingly subcontracting work to lower-cost countries. For example, BAE’s signature Hawk aircraft are being built in India for the Indian air force, with talks reported to be taking place about Hawk production there for the global market.

There is no indication that the company has any interest in its UK manufacturing base except as a bargaining (blackmailing) chip, primarily to gain new contracts from the Ministry of Defence.

Advert 1: ‘Our firsts in engineering help the UK stay a world leader in innovation… In the last two years we’re proud to have launched the Type 45 destroyer and Astute submarine’

BAE projects are routinely late and over budget with the taxpayer left to pick up the bill. Only two weeks before the launch of the BAE ad campaign, a report from the House of Commons Defence Committee revealed that the budget for BAE’s Astute Submarines had increased by 47 per cent and the budget for BAE’s Type 45 Destroyers by 18 per cent, costing the taxpayer £2.2 billion more than expected. The in-service date for the Type 45 is presently three years later than planned.

But a wider question leaps out: what sort of innovation do we want? Nuclear submarines or alternative energy and transport systems? Even civil aviation has been rejected by BAE which sold its stake in Airbus, leaving the 13,000 UK employees subject to the politics surrounding French/German aerospace giant EADS.

Advert 2: ‘We train more skilled engineers in the UK than any other company… We’ve always hired and trained the very best of UK talent’

There is a skills shortage in many areas of UK science and technology. But extensive government support for arms production, not least by means of Research & Development funding, means that arms companies have not been the ones to suffer. In 2005, around £2,600m of government R&D money went to the military sector while a paltry £37m went to renewable energy.

If the government were to reduce its arms expenditure and put the money into technologies required for our wider, environmental security, there would be equivalent levels of skilled employment. A recent government report estimated that the number of jobs in the renewable energy sector could, given supportive enough policies, expand from 8,000 in 2004 to as many as 35,000 by 2020. In contrast to arms companies, this work would be a contribution to global welfare and security.

Advert 3: ‘Last year we spent over £3.2 billion with our UK suppliers… it’s all of us that benefit’

Every company has a network of suppliers. The economic activity that would result from workers moving into other sectors would result in alternative supplier networks.

And the beneficiaries of BAE’s activities? There is no doubt that the company’s decisions are taken not with the UK public or even its own employees in mind, but in order to generate maximum wealth for its international shareholders.