Recommendation 3

HM Government Accepted

The Government agrees on the importance of building public awareness of the threats we face and engaging with industry on working to mitigate those. In developing the National Security Strategy, the Government engaged a broad spectrum of stakeholders, considered assessments and analytical products from think tanks, academics, industry experts and reports from the Intelligence and Security Committee and the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy (JCNSS). It also brought together several strategies, reviews, and audits developed and being developed by the government. These reviews had their own method of engagement, including with civil society organisations and industry. This includes the Resilience Action Plan which a large number of stakeholders, including civil society organisations, were engaged with to support development and delivery. The then Foreign Secretary fulfilled his commitment to update the House on the China Audit. We carried out a comprehensive audit on the breadth of the UK’s relationship with China, which is informing a consistent, long-term and strategic approach, rooted in UK and global interests. This ‘Audit’ informed the National Security Strategy, the Strategic Defence Review and our Trade and Industrial Strategies. The Resilience Action Plan outlines our ambition for resilience to be a whole-of-society effort. Since its publication we have run a public consultation on how to strengthen partnerships between categorised emergency responders and the voluntary, community and faith sector organisations, and we have established a programme of engagement with critical stakeholders and civil society organisations. In July 2025 we published insights from the first UK Public Survey of Risk Perception, Resilience and Preparedness, and we plan to publish findings from the 2026 survey later this year, demonstrating our commitment to engaging with the public on matters of resilience. The UK is committed to driving a whole-of-society approach through its world-leading “transparent by default approach”. HMG is committed to shifting the culture of resilience and the way threats are considered in the UK. The National Risk Register (NRR) is our public facing articulation of the risks facing us, with the last update published in January 2025. A “transparent by default” approach has been adopted, declassifying and sharing information from the internal version, the National Security Risk Assessment (NSRA), except in a small number of highly sensitive areas. In July 2025 we published insights from the first UK Public Survey of Risk Perception, Resilience and Preparedness, released as Official Statistics in Development. We plan to publish findings from the 2026 survey later this year, demonstrating our commitment to monitor trends and evaluate the impact of public communications on preparedness. We will continue to make an annual statement to Parliament on resilience, as set out in our Resilience Action Plan. This government has also published its Defence Industrial Strategy, which outlines our new approach, not just to defence procurement, but also how we engage with industry throughout the supply chain. The upcoming Defence Readiness Bill will improve how we work collectively with industry to improve the readiness of our defence sector.