Brexit: Armed Forces and Diplomatic Service

Earl of Cork and Orrery Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Cork and Orrery (CB) (Maiden Speech)]

My Lords, it is a great privilege to follow the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, who I remember as a young Royal Marine officer in the Far East very many years ago. Equally very many years ago, as youngsters leaving primary school, a kindly headmaster gathered us together and made the point that, although we had reached the top of our first school, our destiny was to start again at the bottom next term and, having worked our way to the top again, to leave, and recommence at the bottom. “In fact”, he said, “that will be your destiny throughout your life”. In joining your Lordships’ House, I feel like that small boy, with the principal difference that, instead of the usual treatment meted out to new boys at secondary schools, I was greeted here with the utmost warmth and kindness. There were only a few frightening adults, and I could find no obvious sneaks and bullies, despite Black Rod’s warnings—only myriad corridors and staircases, guaranteed to leave you feeling very foolish when trying to find someone or something. My sincere and grateful thanks are due to all of those who have assisted me in this fascinating learning process, from doorkeepers and House staff to mentors and colleagues. No names, as they say, and no pack drill, but thank you all.

The long and winding road to these hallowed portals has taken me via 15 years in the Royal Navy, 10 of which were in submarines, where I came across the Special Boat Service, including command during the Cold War of the 1970s. This was followed by 30 years in the City in a global trade house, where I spent many years as a member of the Baltic Exchange. I followed that with a period of cathedral custodianship, which is not a bad precursor to coming to this place, in many ways.

I wish to concentrate today on a relatively narrow aspect of the effects of leaving the European Union—the effect on our coastal and border defences. The new UK economic exclusion zone, or 200-mile limit, did not even exist as such in 1973, when we joined the EEC. It will consist of some 770,000 square kilometres of sea when we leave the EU, and many nations will cast covetous eyes on our riches, both fishy and oily. At the same time, we are faced with myriad considerations in defence of the border, many of which will be exacerbated by our newly independent status. We have to contend not only with serious organised crime, including drug-, people- and firearms-smuggling, but also with modern slavery, terrorism, immigration and, last but not least, fisheries protection and anti-poaching activities. There is a very large Spanish fishing fleet that will be very discomforted by the lack of access—in theory at least—to our parts of the north Atlantic.

The Government’s aim is to secure our borders while still allowing legitimate trade to continue unhindered. This is, of course, an admirable objective, but we do need better funded and co-ordinated command and control facilities. Our border is a unique point of intervention and a critical line of defence, where the UK can, and does, identify and disrupt threats to our security. Brexit will throw our existing facilities and organisation into stark relief, and we need to be prepared for it. Without close and continuing liaison with our closest maritime collaborators and neighbours—Spain, France and the Netherlands—we will struggle to remain masters of our space, so we must maintain this at least as a part of our divorce settlement with the EU.

The National Maritime Information Centre, or NMIC, formed at Northwood in 2010, I believe under the aegis of the noble Lord, Lord West, is an essential tool in the garnering of information, but it is neither funded nor equipped to act as the national command and control centre for the maritime assets committed to border defence, which we urgently need. This funding, which would normally come from Home Office resources, is badly needed—I know this is another rant on the subject of funding our forces—and could transform the capabilities of NMIC. Of the many force elements which go make up NMIC, some are volunteer charities, such as the RNLI, but the majority could contribute, in addition to the Home Office.

The asset base that we have for dealing with all this is minimal and will require reinforcement if we are to be successful in defending our borders against such threats. We currently have a situation where the Border Force has three coastal cutters operating on our 11,000-mile coastline. It owns two more but budget constraints mean that it cannot operate them, so they have been lent temporarily to DfID and are currently in the Mediterranean in support of the refugee effort. The Border Force has also ordered eight high-end RIBs for coastal and riverine patrolling. However, the same constraints will allow it to take delivery of only four of them at this time. It does not currently own or operate any aircraft in a maritime patrol role—partially because of the aforementioned budgetary constraints—although the RAF is eventually due to receive nine new Poseidon long-range maritime patrol aircraft.

The Royal Navy has four larger offshore patrol vessels, suitable for fishery protection in the north Atlantic, although one is permanently stationed in the Falkland Islands, which leaves us with three. The new series of OPVs—called the Batch 2 River class—are under construction and five have been ordered. The fate of the first four, once the new vessels come into service, depends on who you ask, but the 2015 SDSR implies that they may be offered to the Border Force.

The Royal Navy also has a total of 15 mine countermeasures vessels, all of them minehunters. Most of these, as your Lordships are aware, are deployed either in the Clyde—which has seven—to protect the deterrent, or in the Iranian Gulf, which has four. That leaves four, which is clearly inadequate to protect our harbours from mine attack, let alone to assist in the defence of our inshore waters, which has historically been one of the primary roles of MCMVs.

The main objection to providing more assets for the defence of our border, apart from finance, appears to be that we cannot man more vessels, given present low rates of recruitment and retention. However, one asset that seems to be largely overlooked is the Royal Naval Reserve. This force has been allowed to wither on the vine, in contrast to the Army Reserve. Currently, the target is to have 3,000 members of the Royal Navy Reserve. In 1993, the RNR’s squadron of 12 MCMVs was disbanded and sold to foreign buyers. This squadron, based in 11 separate operating bases around our coasts, provided an excellent focal point for volunteer mariners to train and develop their skills and produced some superb seamen. The vessels were used for a multitude of tasks, which included coastal patrolling and defence. Instead of selling or scrapping the four Batch 1 River class OPVs when the Batch 2 vessels become available, why not transfer them to a revitalised Royal Naval Reserve, which could provide much needed back-up to the Border Force, and provide the Royal Navy with a ready source of trained personnel to supplement its very stretched manpower resources? The appeal of joining the current RNR and being trained to act, at most, as an armed guard on board an RN ship is low, but give them their own vessels and the chance to develop as a team and watch recruitment take off, especially among those trained by the RN but leaving for other reasons.