Lord Mandelson: Government Response to Humble Address Motion
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord West of Spithead(1 week, 1 day ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
Time is indeed ticking, but the noble Baroness will be aware we still have two more debates in front of your Lordships’ House before the House rises. The Written Ministerial Statement will be published today, as I said.
On the independence of the ISC, we are incredibly lucky to have Members of your Lordships’ House on the committee, led by my noble friend Lord Beamish. I would never question either his integrity or his ability to do the job. As we laid out, and its correspondence from yesterday makes clear, engagement has already happened. There were meetings between very senior members of the Cabinet Office and of government with members of the ISC on Tuesday, and the process has started. On the timing, as the Minister for the Cabinet Office made clear in the other place, we expect the process on the documentation to continue at pace—and I do not mean at Civil Service pace, I mean at pace—after the Recess.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, as a member of the ISC, I note that my noble friend the Minister did not say anything about my integrity, which is a bit worrying. I make it absolutely clear that deciding what is in scope to be released is totally for the Cabinet Office. The ISC will have nothing to do with that whatever; it will see only the material that the Cabinet Office says that it cannot release because it includes intelligence or foreign affairs. Those will be the only things we look at.
On independence, we have already said that we will not be working in conjunction with the Cabinet Office. We are completely independent. We can be quite bolshie about things, which is good. We will look at it totally separately and work through at pace, as soon as this comes from the Government, where there are difficulties about the Met Police and things such as that. As soon as it starts coming our way, we will work on it.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I thank my noble friend—the idea he could be bolshie would be completely beyond my appreciation of him. He should take it as a given that I consider him to be a man of great integrity. After all, he is a senior officer in our senior service. I will always appreciate and accept him in that way.
What my noble friend said about the role of the ISC is absolutely correct and aligns with my understanding. Obviously, the ISC met with the Cabinet Office Permanent Secretary, the FCDO Permanent Secretary, the Deputy National Security Adviser and the acting director-general of propriety and ethics this week to set out how this will work. That meeting was considered fruitful and constructive, and I hope that, in the coming weeks, the relationship will continue in that vein.
Wales: Further Devolution
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord West of Spithead(2 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
This Government always support Wales—and I will be doing so this weekend when they are playing the Springboks. On the noble Lord’s specific point, last week I sat in on the debate that he mentioned, in which he raised some really interesting points that were answered by my noble friend. I will reflect on what he says and return to him on that.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, I understand that one of our late and long-awaited frigates is to be called HMS “Cardiff”. Are we going to put any of the new factories producing defence equipment, and ammunition in particular, in Wales?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My noble friend always manages to get a ship into his question. For that, as an honorary captain in the Royal Navy, I am very grateful. He is absolutely right about HMS “Cardiff”—I am still waiting for HMS “Stoke-on Trent”, but my lobbying has not yet been effective. We have seen, as we have wider conversations about the expanded defence industrial strategy, that some of that work will absolutely be going to Wales.
Office for National Statistics
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord West of Spithead(3 months, 1 week ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Lord raises a genuinely important point about the quality and calibre of our data and how we collect it. As the world moves on, so has our need for data, and how we use and collect it. We expect the ONS to be using all available resources to it. We also need to make sure of the value—especially with regard to the census, for example—of survey-based data, because it is some of the most effective and efficient available to us.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, my noble friend the Minister will be aware that when I was First Sea Lord, I used to encourage my sailors to all be on board the ships when they were working.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
Why should the Civil Service work to a different pattern? Admittedly it has few ships, but I would be very interested to know.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My Lords, as an honorary captain in the Royal Navy, I would never want to disagree with a much more senior officer. The noble Lord raises a genuinely important point. While people who do not necessarily have to be deployed also have the 60% target for being in the office, there is an issue here about making sure that we have people in the right place at the right time, especially when we are trying to effect cultural change. That is what is clearly required at the ONS, according to both the reviews that have been undertaken.
Armed Forces Recruitment
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord West of Spithead
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My Lords, one of the themes of the strategic defence review is to explore the approach to recruiting, educating, training and retaining the people needed for “one defence”. This includes the regular reserve, the Civil Service and industry. It simply is not always appropriate for people in uniform to do some of these jobs, and we need to utilise those in uniform where they can best serve. The SDR will be published in the spring—and by the spring I mean “Civil Service spring”, so it will be imminent. While we are here, I thank my noble friend Lord Robertson for his work on the SDR.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, 43 years ago today, at this time, I was under heavy air attack and was later sunk. Recruiting at that stage was very buoyant—thank goodness, after one sinks. Post the war, it became even more buoyant. We have never had any shortage in this country, thank goodness, of young men and women who are patriotic and willing to risk their all for our nation. It seemed as though our recruiting system was trying to actively stop recruiting those people. I am very glad we have now got around that.
I will ask my noble friend the Minister two questions. Are we doing something special to get the engineers we are so very short of, particularly in the Air Force and the Navy, and the technicians who are crucial for our weapons systems? Is the UK Military Flying Training System now fit for purpose, because it has not been for a few years?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I thank my noble friend not just for the question but for his incredible service. He highlights exactly what he did to keep our country safe and why people want to join our Armed Forces. I am proud to be his noble friend. I have to say I was disappointed because I had an update on ships, which is what I thought he was going to ask me about.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
Just for my noble friend: HMS “Glasgow”, a new Type 26 will officially enter the Royal Navy tomorrow.
On the specifics of his question, I will have to revert on some details but let me be very clear on how we are recruiting and ensuring that people can come through, especially engineers. We are looking at each pinch point individually, and for tri-service air engineers we have offered a £30,000 incentive.