Government Resilience Action Plan

Alex Burghart Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)]

I thank the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster for advance sight of his statement and the associated documentation. I also thank him for the date on which the UK emergency alert will be tested—he can only have chosen it to notify the country that it is my birthday. I shall very much look forward to the alarm at 3 pm.

I understand why the Government want to plan for resilience. It is understandable that the Government would want to come forward with a plan, faced with the collapsing economy, a collapsing Government, capital flight, spiralling borrowing costs and the Office for Budget Responsibility’s warning this morning that the Chancellor’s latest U-turns have left Britain more vulnerable and less able to respond to future crises. As the Minister said, the plan published today builds on the work of the previous Government on the roll-out of the national emergency alert system, the expansion of biosecurity preparedness, investment in flood protection and ensuring better cross-departmental collaboration on resilience and emergency preparedness.

The Minister said in his statement that he was looking for an assessment “on a continuous basis”. The report sets out the intention for data collection in this area, but it would be useful to hear by when that new data framework will be available for us to scrutinise. He said that he wished to enable

“the whole of society to take action”,

but I rather wonder how he intends the whole of society to find out about this. The plan calls on the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to provide guidance on developing cohesion strategies and to monitor tensions. However, that does not sit easily with the fact that the Government are not currently tackling Islamist extremism properly, that they dragged their feet on a national inquiry into grooming gangs, and that they seem to be bringing forward a highly controversial definition of Islamophobia.

The Minister referred to

“improving core public sector resilience”.

That is certainly to be welcomed, particularly on a day on which it has been announced that resident doctors have voted in favour of strikes, which will result in industrial action in January. It was notable that the plan does not mention an ability to deal with widespread industrial action. Are the Government planning for the eventuality of a general strike?

The Minister also mentioned the increase in defence spending, which we know is a form of smoke and mirrors. We understand that the 1.5% in addition to the hypothetical 3.5% includes things such as tunnels and roads, but we have not been provided with a baseline for what is currently spent in those areas. How will we know when the Government have got to 1.5%, or indeed whether they are at 1.5% already?

As the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster set out, the previous Government took steps to extend our capabilities and published the first UK biological security strategy. I was interested that, in this strategy, there is a reference to exploring the utility of waste water analysis, which had great success during the pandemic. Does the Minister intend to bring that back on a wide scale? It would be welcome if that was the case.

I am pleased that the Government are pressing ahead with the biothreats radar, which was a Conservative idea, but two years after our announcement there is still no go-live date. This could be a major asset to national resilience, but we need to know when it will come online. The CDL also told the House that a fully operational radar will give us near real-time warning of emerging pathogens, but the World Health Organisation is still reminding China to hand over its basic virological data on covid-19. Can he guarantee that the radar will allow the UK to independently verify when a state actor chooses to withhold or delay information?

I was interested to read about Exercise Pegasus, the preparations for pandemic exercise. However, as the Minister will know, different types of pandemic behave in different ways. Which pandemics were tested in Pegasus? Which were tested in Alkarab? It is important that the House understands what the Government are looking at in that regard.

[Pat McFadden]

I am grateful to the Opposition spokesman for his questions. Several things have contributed to the need for a fresh look at all of this: the experience of covid, the changing geopolitical situation and the changing threat picture. It is important to be both flexible and dynamic when considering resilience.

Let me turn to the shadow Minister’s specific points. In advance of his birthday on 7 September, I wish him many happy returns. He asked about data collection. That does not have a date; it is a constant effort. The capacity to use data in a better way today than perhaps we could have done in the past is an additional weapon in our armoury.

In terms of the whole of society finding out about this, we have good, sensible advice on gov.uk/prepare. I encourage the public to look at it, and I hope that these preparation measures become normal for people in the future. The strength of community is very important in community resilience.

The shadow Minister referred to strikes in the NHS. We have given the NHS significant financial support and made a very fair pay offer. We very much value the work that doctors do. We hope that everyone in the NHS realises that we are a Government who support the NHS and want to work with the staff, and that industrial action will contribute nothing to that goal.

The shadow Minister referred to biological security. We are making important investments into that, including the opening of the new Weybridge lab announced by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs a couple of weeks ago.

Exercise Pegasus has not happened yet; it will happen in the autumn. However, the shadow Minister is right on one thing: it is important not to fight the last war and assume that the next pandemic will behave in the same way as the last one. We have to be flexible in our response and ensure that we plan for different kinds of scenarios.