Exercise Pegasus 2025

Lord Stirrup Excerpts

Thursday 15th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

My noble friend, who is a world-leading expert in this area, is absolutely right. All exercises should be about ensuring that we can adopt a whole-of-society approach to resilience. That includes making sure that all key stakeholders are involved. Conversations and engagement are ongoing, but, to reassure your Lordships’ House, not only were 6,000 professionals mobilised in each phase of this exercise but we had 16 focus groups and four population surveys, and 2,000 members of the public were involved. That included specific focus groups with the voluntary sector and key businesses to make sure that we could and can deliver. Fundamentally, these exercises are about making sure that the right relationships, as well as the right structures, are in place.

[Lord Stirrup (CB)]

My Lords, Exercise Pegasus 2025 was clearly extremely useful. However, the Chief of the Defence Staff was recently reported as saying that we do not have a holistic plan for the mobilisation of the NHS in the event of a large-scale conflict. What action is being taken to assess the requirements of such a mobilisation and to take any necessary remedial action?

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

The noble and gallant Lord makes an incredibly important point about making sure that every part of our society is involved and prepared for whatever crisis may come before us. There is no more important role for this Government than keeping our people safe, by ensuring that we have a strong Armed Forces and that our public services can cope with these moments. The Chief of the Defence Staff was clear in his evidence to the HCDC that the UK national defence plan will be developed across 2026, in line with our NATO commitments at home and abroad.