Prime minister accompanied by executives from six defence firms after Japan relaxes postwar procurement rules
David Cameron says he wants to take the UK's relationship with 'old friends' Japan 'even further'. Photograph: Carl Court/PA
David Cameron flying to Tokyo with some of Britain's leading defence manufacturers as Downing Street seeks to exploit a multibillion-pound market after a liberalising of Japan's procurement rules.
The prime minister is taking executives from six defence contractors, including BAE Systems and AgustaWestland, as Britain prepares to embark on developing weapons jointly with Japan. Tokyo has agreed to name Britain as its first overseas defence trading partner after the US.
Downing Street – acutely sensitive to charges that the prime minister drums up business for defence manufacturers on his overseas tours – will hope that the focus of Tuesday's visit will be on Nissan's Yokohama headquarters, where the carmaker will announce a £127m investment in its Sunderland plant to produce its new hatchback, expected to create 225 jobs.
The prime minister also hopes to hail the role of Professor Sir John Beddington, the government's chief scientific adviser, who said the British embassy in Tokyo should remain open after the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant in March last year. Beddington, whose advice was read avidly in Japan after the disaster, will also be accompanying the prime minister.
But Cameron's talks in Tokyo with Yoshihiko Noda, his Japanese counterpart, will be dominated by expected deals on defence co-operation and Britain's role in helping Japan with its nuclear decommissioning. These could eventually dwarf the relatively modest Japanese inward investment deals, worth £200m, that will be signed on the trip.
The prime minister is taking representatives of the defence manufacturers, which also include Babcock, MBDA, Rolls Royce and Thales, because officials believe there is a major opportunity as Japan opens up its multibillion-pound defence market. Britain hopes to win a share of the market, which had been open only to Japanese and US companies since 1967.
A blanket ban came into force in 1976, although this did not apply to the US.
In December last year Japan lifted the ban – a move technically outside the terms of the postwar constitution, enacted in 1947, which banned "land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential". Japan has traditionally circumvented the ban by building up its armed forces with the help of the most formidable of the allied powers in 1945, the US.
The Mainichi newspaper last week quoted defence ministry officials in Tokyo as saying that Cameron and Noda would formally agree to begin defence co-operation talks. The officials said it could take a year to decide on areas where the two countries would co-operate, but they are expected to start initially with the joint development of military equipment.
Britain says progress has already been made in highly technical preliminary negotiations. This has involved persuading the Japanese that UK defence equipment is "interoperable" and meets the security requirements of both sides.
Cameron will work hard to press British interests after Japan recently chose US-made Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets over the Eurofighter Typhoon manufactured by a consortium of European companies, including BAE Systems.
Cameron faced embarrassment in February last year over the promotion of Britain's defence industry when he took a delegation of manufacturers to the Gulf. He began the trip by hailing democracy in Cairo's Tahrir Square – before flying to Kuwait with eight defence manufacturers. The prime minister will argue that this trip is different because Japan is a democracy.
Downing Street believes in recent years Britain has overlooked its relationship with Japan, which is the world's third largest economy and whose investments in the UK come to more than £26bn, accounting for 130,000 jobs. Japan is only the 14th largest export market for UK goods, though this grew by 7% last year.
Tony Blair paid the last bilateral visit by a British prime minister to Japan in 2003. Cameron was due to visit Japan last October on his way to the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Australia. But by then he had already visited China, India and the US. The prime minister will be accompanied on his trip to Japan and south-east Asia by executives from 33 companies and four universities.
In an interview with the Japanese daily Yomiuri, the world's largest newspaper, Cameron said he hoped to revive ties with an old ally. "We do have very good relations between Britain and Japan. We're old friends, we're old allies, we're partners in many senses. But I think we can take the relationship even further."
Cameron paid tribute to the way the Japanese people had responded to the twin disasters of the tsunami and the subsequent nuclear disaster at Fukushima last year. "I greatly admire and respect the way the Japanese have overcome the enormous challenges of recovery following last year's earthquake. The UK stood by Japan in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake when we kept our embassy open in Tokyo and through the reassuring advice of our chief scientific adviser, Sir John Beddington, who will be joining me on this trip.
"Looking to the future, we want to continue to support the Japanese as they reconstruct the Tohoku region and tackle the challenges of the nuclear clean-up. British companies have significant expertise in nuclear decommissioning and clean-up, with 19 nuclear sites in the UK currently being managed through the process."
