Continuous At-Sea Deterrent
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 1 month ago)
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Gavin Williamson
The hon. Lady and I will probably always find room for disagreement on this. I will come on to the issue of deterrence later.
I want to make progress, because it would be remiss of me not to mention the town of Barrow-in-Furness and give our thanks to the people of Barrow, who have crafted these giants of the deep and continue to do so, ensuring that we have the right technology and the right vessels to deliver our nuclear deterrent.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I thank the Secretary of State for the way in which he is introducing the debate. The question about other countries possessing nuclear weapons takes me back to the old arguments where we used to ask people to name a single country that would either acquire nuclear weapons because we had got them, or get rid of them if we decided unilaterally to get rid of ours. Do you know what? They never came up with the name of one country.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I am delighted to follow two such supportive speeches on the nuclear deterrent and the work of those who have crewed it for the past 50 years. It is amazing to think of the combination of high training and long periods of low activity that such personnel have to undergo. They truly are the silent guardians of the country and we are hugely in their debt.
What is more, most Members of this House recognise that fact. It is worth putting on the record that in recent years the House has had two key votes on the question of the renewal of the nuclear deterrent submarine fleet, the first under the Labour Government of Tony Blair on 14 March 2007. The House voted by 409 to 161—a massive majority of 248—to proceed with the initial gate of the replacement or successor submarine fleet. The second was under the Conservative Government of the current Prime Minister on 18 July 2016, when the House voted by a colossal majority of 355—namely, 472 votes to 117—to proceed to the main stages of development and production of the submarines.
The only issue to which I took a little exception in the contribution of the shadow Defence Secretary, the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith), was in one turn of phrase, when she said how appalling it would be if the deterrence weapons were used. I remind her gently that the nuclear deterrent is in use every day of every week all around the year, because the purpose of the nuclear deterrent is to ensure that nuclear war does not break out because no one is in a position to attack us with impunity.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)
In the right hon. Gentleman’s description of the deterrent, will he explain why none of the missiles is actually targeted at any targets?
Dr Lewis
It is for the simple reason that, in the unlikely event of anyone being mad enough to attack us—because we have the ability to retaliate—it would be simple to target missiles to retaliate against them, and that could easily result in the obliteration of any country unwise enough to launch a nuclear attack against a nuclear power such as ourselves.
Mr Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)
I join my right hon. Friend in applauding the speech from the shadow Defence Secretary, but does he share my disappointment that she did not take any interventions? She may have been able to explain the fundamental flaw in Labour’s Front-Bench position, which is that we cannot have an effective deterrent if we have committed never to use it, as the shadow Chancellor and the Leader of the Opposition have done.
Dr Lewis
I accept the fact that Labour has a problem with certain key figures who have always been opposed in principle to the possession of a nuclear deterrent. However, today is not the day to have that debate. I know that the shadow Defence Secretary and every one of the Labour Back Benchers whom I see opposite are wholly committed to keeping this country safe and strong. If anyone can ensure that the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Chancellor are not allowed to undermine the sensible policy outlined from the Opposition Front Bench today, it is that cohort of people. I wish them the best of luck in that endeavour.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
The right hon. Gentleman described a situation in which we would be able to retaliate if we were attacked. I do not know about him, but if I had been obliterated by a nuclear weapon, I would not care a jot whether we obliterated somebody back.
Dr Lewis
I am sorry to have to explain to the hon. Lady that the whole point of our ability to retaliate is to ensure that we are not attacked in the first place. One really does not have to have had more than half a century of experience to realise that that is bound to be the case. I was not going to quote Professor Sir Henry Tizard, whom I have quoted in debates many times before, but it looks like it is necessary for me to do so.
Professor Tizard was the leading defence scientist in the second world war at the time when atomic weapons were being created. In 1945, with a committee of leading scientists, including Nobel prize winners, he was supposed to look forward to see what the future nature of warfare might be. His committee was not allowed to explore the atomic bomb project in detail, but he insisted on putting in this primary rationale for nuclear deterrence, which holds as firmly today as it did in June 1945. He explained that the only answer that those senior defence scientists, with all their experience of the second world war, could see to the advent of the atomic bomb was the preparedness to use it in retaliation, thus preventing an attack in the first place. I am sorry to inflict this on the House again, but he said:
“A knowledge that we were prepared, in the last resort, to do this”—
to retaliate—
“might well deter an aggressive nation. Duelling was a recognised method of settling quarrels between men of high social standing so long as the duellists stood twenty paces apart and fired at each other with pistols of a primitive type. If the rule had been that they should stand a yard apart with pistols at each other’s hearts, we doubt whether it would long have remained a recognised method of settling affairs of honour.”
In other words, if someone knows that they are going to die, for a certainty, if they launch an attack against somebody else, they are not going to launch that attack in the first place.
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
I thank the right hon. Gentleman and the Secretary of State for actually taking interventions. Anyone who knows the history of the continuous nuclear deterrent knows that it is heavily reliant upon a relationship with the United States. With the present occupant of the White House being such a transactional individual, and with the United Kingdom about to enter into trade negotiations with the US, how confident is the right hon. Gentleman that his Government’s negotiators will not, say, trade chlorinated chicken and access to the NHS—[Interruption.] I am talking technically. How confident is he that that would be not be traded for the United States role in the nuclear deterrent? Although he knows that I fully oppose it, of course.
Dr Lewis
The hon. Gentleman is an admirable member of the Defence Committee, and we greatly value his contributions, but I do not think that that was his most stellar contribution—[Laughter.] Sometimes people say, “Well, what if the Americans wanted to have some sort of veto or to stop us using the nuclear deterrent?”—I mean using it in the sense of firing it rather than of using it in the sense that it is used all day long every day of the year to prevent nuclear conflict. The first point is that this nuclear system is totally under our own control. It would gradually wither on the vine over a long period of time only if the United States decided for some reason that it no longer wanted there to be a second centre of nuclear decision making within the NATO alliance. At any time now, as it has been for the last 50 years, it is entirely independently controlled by us.
The second point is about why an American president would ever not want there to be a second centre of nuclear decision making in NATO, because that reduces any temptation of an aggressor against NATO to think that it could pick off this country without America responding.
Richard Benyon
Looking forward, does my right hon. Friend agree that renewing the fleet with the new Dreadnought class is the most important decision? In doing so, we have decided that we cannot predict what is going to happen in 20, 30 or 40 years. Those who want us to get rid of the deterrent and not renew our fleet are taking a terrible gamble in a dangerous world, because we cannot foresee the enemies that we may face in the decades ahead.
Dr Lewis
I pay tribute to the people who work at Aldermaston in my right hon. Friend’s constituency for all that they contribute to the maintenance of our nuclear deterrent capability. Not only do I agree with him, but he has led me nicely back to the central theme of my narrative, which was to try to set out for the House the five main military arguments in favour of retaining our independent deterrent, the first of which is precisely the point that he has just made. Future military threats and conflicts will be no more predictable than those that engulfed us throughout the 20th century. That is the overriding justification for preserving armed forces in peacetime as a national insurance policy. No one knows what enemies might confront us during the next 30 to 50 years, but it is highly probable that at least some of them will be armed with mass-destruction weapons.
The second argument is that it is not the weapons themselves that we have to fear but the nature of the regimes that possess them. Whereas democracies are generally reluctant to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear dictatorships—although they did use them against Japan in 1945—the reverse is not true. Think, for example, what the situation would have been in 1982 if a non-nuclear Britain had faced an Argentina in possession of even a few tactical nuclear bombs and the means of delivering them. There would have been no question of our being able to retake the Falkland Islands in that conflict.
Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)
This is such an important point. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, when we speak about freedom, our independent at-sea deterrent has been one of the most important factors in securing freedom and democracy around the world?
Dr Lewis
Absolutely. If we get into a situation where the United States and the NATO alliance are paralysed in the face of dictatorships armed even with a few mass-destruction weapons that cannot be neutralised by the threat of retaliation, there would be no prospect of our mounting a defence of any country under attack, anywhere in the world, no matter how deserving it might be of our military intervention.
The third argument is that the United Kingdom has traditionally played a more important and decisive role in preserving freedom than other medium-sized states have been able or willing to play. Democratic countries without nuclear weapons have little choice but to declare themselves neutral and hope for the best or, alternatively, to rely upon the nuclear umbrella of powerful allies. The United Kingdom is already a nuclear power and is also much harder to defeat by conventional means because of our physical separation from the continent.
The fourth argument is that our prominence as the principal ally of the United States, our strategic geographical position and the fact that we are obviously the junior partner might tempt an aggressor to think of attacking us separately. Given the difficulty of overrunning the United Kingdom with conventional forces, by contrast to our more vulnerable allies on the continent, an aggressor could be tempted to use one or more mass-destruction weapons against us on the assumption that the United States might not reply on our behalf. Even if that assumption were false, the attacker would find out his mistake when, and only when, it was too late for all concerned. An independently controlled British nuclear deterrent massively reduces the prospect of such a fatal miscalculation.
The final military argument is that no quantity of conventional forces can compensate for the military disadvantage that faces a non-nuclear country in a war against a nuclear-armed enemy. The atomic bombing of Japan is especially instructive not only because the Emperor was forced to surrender but because of the reverse scenario. Imagine if Japan had developed atomic bombs in the summer of 1945 and the allies had not. An invasion to end the war would then have been completely impossible.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
Quite a few colleagues in the House have served in the British Army of the Rhine—I served there three times. When we, as conventional forces, practised deploying against an enemy, we were much sustained by the knowledge that there was a nuclear back-up in our armoury. That raised our morale. We thought that people would not dare attack us when we had a nuclear device in our hand. It would be mad to get rid of it.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. To help Members, I will be aiming for 10 minutes each from Back Benchers.
Dr Lewis
I will endeavour to finish quickly, Mr Deputy Speaker.
My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) was right to think in those terms when he wore that uniform. What is more, hon. Members on both sides of the House, in very large numbers, think in similar terms.
To bring my remarks speedily to a conclusion, I will draw out five lessons that have impressed themselves on me in such debates over the past 35 years, since we replaced the first-generation Polaris submarine fleet with the second-generation Vanguard submarine fleet.
The first lesson is that the concepts of unilateralism and multilateralism are mutually incompatible. One requires the unconditional abandonment of our nuclear weapons and nuclear alliances, whereas the other would consider nuclear renunciation only if our potential enemies carry it out at the same time.
The second lesson is that a nuclear-free world is not necessarily a more peaceful world. Abolition of the nuclear balance of terror would be a curse and not a blessing if it made the world once again safe for all-out conventional conflict between the superpowers. In military terms, Russia remains a superpower, regardless of complacent western analyses of the weakness of her economy.
The third lesson is the fundamental divide—which we see in today’s debate—between those people in western societies who believe that wars result mainly from groundless mutual fear and suspicion, and those who believe that only the prospect of retaliation in kind prevents adventurist states from acting aggressively.
The fourth lesson is the validity of the hackneyed but nevertheless accurate concept of the silent majority. Although individual polling questions can be devised to produce apparent majorities against deploying particular nuclear systems, whenever the fundamental issue of deterrence has been posed the result is always decisive. Two thirds of the British people want us to continue to possess nuclear weapons as long as other countries have them, and only one quarter want us to give them up unconditionally.
The final lesson is that since fewer than 10% of our people have been undecided in poll after poll on this fundamental issue, it does not make political sense to try to appease either that small group or the much larger number of highly committed unilateralists such as my friends in the Scottish National party. The strategic task for the Government, and for the Opposition, is to reinforce the views of the two thirds who believe in what may be termed peace through strength and deterrence, rather than peace through disarmament, so the issue will be in the forefront of people’s minds, as it was in the general elections of 1983 and 1987, when this was a very prominent topic in the election debate.
None of this would be possible but for the dedication and, indeed, heroism of those people who, month after month, patrol the seas and are not seen and not heard—they are meant to be not seen and not heard—in order silently to spread over us an umbrella of nuclear protection. Long may they continue to do so.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)
When I rose to make my maiden speech on 1 July 2015, I touched on the Trident programme, because it is close to my heart. In fact, it is very close to my constituency. At the time, I mentioned that Trident seemed to be a bit of an abstract concept. People know it is out there, but they do not know what it is, how much it costs, how much it cannot be used and what it is actually doing as a deterrent.
If people stand on the shore of my constituency, they will often see Vanguard class submarines moving silently through the deep waters. They catch the sunlight, which shimmers along their long, sleek, black bodies as they cut through the surface of the water. Their colour may suggest giant eels, but they lack the elegance. They are, however, engineering marvels. It takes some doing to fire a missile from beneath the water’s surface, project it through the water until it breaks free, and manage two controlled explosions that project the missile to a pre-defined target where ballistic missiles carrying nuclear warheads are released and either explode on impact or are exploded automatically at the required height to cause maximum death and destruction. Mankind has never lacked ingenuity when it comes to inventing ways of killing each other. I cannot help but wonder what else we could have achieved with all that time, effort, ingenuity and money.
The issue we have is that successive Governments of the United Kingdom have supported and expanded the nuclear weapons programme at eye-watering cost. Why? When I sit in the House of Commons, I talk to many Members who support Trident. I can tell them that these weapons can kill tens of millions of people. But they know that. I can tell them that the watershed will be poisoned, crops will fail and many more will die in the most degrading ways from famine, pestilence and plague. But they know that. I can share stories of survivors, such as Setsuko Thurlow, who told me of people falling to the ground, bellies extended and bursting as they hit the ground, of people trying to carry their own eyes that had fallen out of their heads, and of people with their flesh falling off their bones as they died in agony.
I can also tell Members that WMD have not stopped wars across the globe from Vietnam to Afghanistan. But they know that. I can tell them that WMD are no protection from terrorism. But they know that. I can tell them that the £205 billion could be spent on health, education, housing, transport or even financing our conventional armed forces. But they know that, too.
The majority of supporters of WMD are just like me with one vital difference. They believe that WMD are a deterrent. They believe their existence has kept us safe. As those weapons have existed during a period in which we have avoided wars on the scale of the first and second world wars, I can see where they are coming from. If people believe that keeping their guard up is keeping them safe, then lowering their guard is a frightening thing to do. In this case, they are so frightened that they are prepared to carry out the greatest atrocity humankind has ever perpetrated, and have it done in their name. Well, not in my name. Not all countries believe that nuclear warfare is required. Maybe as many as nine countries feel the need to have nuclear weapons, out of 200.
Dr Julian Lewis
I make one point for the hon. Gentleman’s consideration—one could say exactly the same thing about poison gas, which was used in the first world war and not in the second. It was not used in the second because of fear of overwhelming retaliation. The British warned that we had those stocks and that we would retaliate not only on our own behalf but on behalf of our allies such as Russia. The question is, which keeps the peace?
Ronnie Cowan
We could say that about almost any weapon that we have managed to invent. The threat escalates because such weapons exist. We sit in this Chamber to debate all sorts of subjects, which we sometimes try to do in a fairly amicable manner. If that escalated and went beyond debate, it could turn to violence—but it does not, because we respect each other, we back off and we discuss it. We say to kids in the streets, “Don’t carry knives. If you are carrying one and I’m carrying one, someone will get stabbed.” We talk to those kids, saying, “Don’t carry those weapons,” yet here in this place our attitude towards ending war is to escalate the weapons that people can carry.
Caroline Lucas
If the right hon. Gentleman really thinks that 122 countries around the world are engaging in gesture politics, I would suggest to him that it is perhaps more a gesture from him than it is from them. I believe in Britain taking a leadership role. Perhaps he does not. The constant sitting back and waiting for something else to happen—doing the wrong thing—would frankly be unconscionable.
It is very easy to characterise those of us who are against nuclear weapons as somehow not living in the real world, so perhaps I could just remind the House that there are plenty of people within the military world who do not think that nuclear weapons are a useful tool going forward. Back in 2014, senior political and diplomatic figures—including people such as the former Conservative Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind, former Defence Secretary Des Browne and former Foreign Secretary Lord Owen—came together with very high-ranking military personnel to say that they believe that the risks posed by nuclear weapons and the international dynamics that could lead to nuclear weapons being used are being underestimated and that those risks are insufficiently understood by world leaders.
The Government’s main argument for replacing Trident appears to be that it is the ultimate insurance in an uncertain world. I argue that they fail to acknowledge that it is our very possession of nuclear weapons that is making that world more uncertain. Nor have the advocates of nuclear weapons ever explained why, if Trident is so vital to protecting us, that is not also the case for every other country in the world. The Secretary of State did not answer me at the beginning of this debate—it seems a long time ago now—when I put it to him that we have no moral arguments to put to other countries to ask them not to acquire nuclear weapons if we ourselves are not only keeping them but upgrading them. I put it to him again that a world in which every country is striving for, and potentially achieving, nuclear weapons would be an awful lot more dangerous than the world we have today.
Dr Julian Lewis
Let me try this question again. If we were to give up our nuclear weapons, which other countries that possess nuclear weapons would follow suit? Does the hon. Lady know how many nuclear warheads have been reduced as a result of us reducing our nuclear warhead totals unilaterally? The answer is a big fat zero.
Caroline Lucas
That is why one needs international processes such as the UN treaty that I have described, which is supported by 122 countries, to make that happen. Although I am personally in favour of unilateral nuclear disarmament, that is not the case that I am making this afternoon. I am moving one step towards people such as hon. Members like himself—or right hon. Members like himself, perhaps, I cannot really remember—who I completely understand are never going to be persuaded by unilateral nuclear disarmament, but who I hope might be willing to engage in a serious argument about multilateral nuclear disarmament.
So far there has been very little recognition in this debate of the fact that nuclear weapons systems are themselves fallible. According to a shocking report by Chatham House, there have been 13 incidents since 1962 in which nuclear weapons have very nearly been launched. One of the most dramatic, in 1983, was when Stanislav Petrov, the duty officer in a Soviet nuclear war early-warning centre, found his system warning of the launch of five US missiles. After a few moments of agonising, he judged it, thankfully and correctly, to be a false alarm. If he had reached a different conclusion and passed the information up the control chain, that could have triggered the firing of nuclear missiles from Russia.
Mr Speaker
Oh, very well. Let us have a point of order from Dr Julian Lewis—the good doctor.
Dr Lewis
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Is there any way within the rules of order that I can point out that the nuclear deterrent has been supported on this occasion by a ratio of 7:1, which is even greater than the normal ratio whenever public opinion is tested on this very important matter?
Oral Answers to Questions
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 1 month ago)
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Mark Lancaster
Having served as Chief of the General Staff and then as Chief of the Defence Staff during the height of the troubles, Lord Bramall clearly brings a unique perspective to these difficult issues. The House will understand that prosecutorial decisions in Northern Ireland are taken by the Public Prosecution Service and that the PPS is independent both of the UK Government and of the Northern Ireland Executive. The Government recognise, however, that the current system for dealing with the legacy of Northern Ireland’s past is not working well for anyone, and that is why the Ministry of Defence is working closely with the Northern Ireland Office on new arrangements, including to ensure that our armed forces and police officers are not unfairly treated.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Members of the Defence Committee were very pleased by the way Ministers set up the dedicated unit to look into this question and by the work the Attorney General has been doing. Have the proposals that are apparently to be brought forward in the Queen’s Speech yet been finalised and accepted at Cabinet level?
Mark Lancaster
My right hon. Friend highlights—because he understands them—the complexities of this issue, not the least of which is that it transcends not just Northern Ireland but different judicial systems in the United Kingdom. We are making progress, and we have applied to bring the subject forward in the Queen’s Speech, but we have yet to conclude this work.
A Better Defence Estate
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Ellwood
I welcome the hon. Lady’s tone and her general support in this area. She is right to talk of the bond that exists between any unit, garrison or base and the local community. Many of those bonds go back decades and even centuries. We are very conscious that upheaval will provide change and a little bit of instability and hence needs to be managed.
The hon. Lady touched on the fact that the plan for these 90 sites started two years ago and almost suggested that she wanted answers for the 90 sites in two years. It is a 25-year programme. There are lots of pieces to the jigsaw—for example, troops returning from Germany. When we vacate one location, we move personnel somewhere else. We need to ensure that all those parts are in place, which is why there are sometimes delays, but those delays must be kept to a minimum.
The hon. Lady mentioned the housing targets. She is right to say that our Department can contribute to the challenge of meeting Britain’s housing needs. In many cases, it is not the MOD that is the reason why the right houses are not being built, but the chronology of events. We announce an area to be liberated for housing, but if the local authority has not included that in its housing plan, it takes some time for that to happen. She is right that we should not renege on our duty to expedite this.
I want to stress that we are looking at not simply providing housing but building communities. Wethersfield is a great example. In many of the areas we are looking at, I am encouraging local authorities to look at providing jobs too. It is about a dual purpose—housing as well as areas for businesses, schools or academic facilities. We should not have a knee-jerk reaction and say, “Let’s build houses for the sake of it.” The hon. Lady mentioned the role of trade unions, which are an important part of this. The Defence Infrastructure Organisation works closely with trade unions, along with other stakeholders, to ensure that their voices are heard.
The hon. Lady touched on recruitment and retention. One reason that we are investing £4 billion over this period is to ensure we have places that are attractive to the next generation, who will look at them and say, “That’s the sort of place I want to work, train in and live in.” However, she is right to imply that there have been some challenges. I do not think this debate is so much about Capita itself, but it would be a missed opportunity for her not to mention that, and it has certainly been taken into account.
The hon. Lady touches on the issue, which I can add to, of where reserves will continue to train. Many of our reserve regiments and so forth use the regular facilities for their own purposes—I could add the cadets to that as well. It has very much been at the forefront of our minds to make sure that we do not lose the important asset of our reservist capability and our cadets simply because of the defence estate optimisation programme.
I would be more than delighted to meet the hon. Lady to discuss this in detail. I do not know when I will next update the House, but I assure her that when the next batch of changes is to take place, I would be delighted to come here and answer questions. I should add that, for right hon. and hon. Members who are affected by today’s events, a letter to them has been placed on the letter board with details of what is happening in their constituencies.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
May I welcome what the Minister said about the upcoming 75th anniversary of D-day? Are he and right hon. and hon. Members aware that the Royal British Legion is looking for veterans to make a trip to the Normandy beaches in honour of that anniversary? I hope right hon. and hon. Members will alert veterans whom they know to that opportunity.
May I ask the Minister what sort of financial model he anticipates for the development of some of these bases? Questions have rightly been raised in the past about the adequacy of the private finance initiative model. The legendarily close relationship between the Treasury and the MOD should be bringing forth something typically productive, and I wonder how we are doing in that respect.
Mr Ellwood
First, I am pleased that my right hon. Friend has mentioned the prospect or possibility of veterans returning to Normandy for the 75th anniversary. He obviously does not follow my tweets, because I have promoted this very thing, and the MOD is involved in chartering—[Interruption.] He is not on Twitter.
Mr Ellwood
My right hon. Friend does not do social media—very wise. I will send him a pigeon with the information.
Let me take this opportunity, if I may, to say that if there are veterans wishing to participate and to return to Normandy for this incredible anniversary, a facility has been made available by the MOD, working with Royal British Legion, and we very much look forward to it.
My right hon. Friend touches on the financial packages. He is aware that the PFI model is being moved away from. We do seek recognition from the Treasury that, if it is not a financial vehicle that it wants to continue to use, we will need other support, and I hope that will be forthcoming in the spending review.
Carrier Strike Strategy
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I congratulate all four Members who have spoken so far. Only one of them is a member of the Defence Committee, which I have the honour to chair. Given their depth of knowledge and enormous enthusiasm, the Defence Committee will not be short of worthy members in the future. I encourage those who are not yet on it to redouble their efforts to be so at the first opportunity. The beneficiaries of their enthusiasm and breadth of knowledge will be the House and the country as a whole.
The previous speeches have not left me with as much to say as I might otherwise have said. That is an additional benefit to anybody watching the debate. I will pick and choose a few points here and there from what has been said already, and try to develop them into a theme of strategy and adversaries. When I talk about adversaries, I am really talking about one overwhelming adversary: the Treasury. We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan) that, after bringing in one of the two largest vessels ever built for the Royal Navy, the Treasury might be thinking of mothballing it. I suppose that is a little better than the proposal that I heard from one George Osborne in the run-up to the 2010 election, which was to scrap the project for building the carriers completely. It is amazing how many times we have almost lost the ability to project air power from the sea. In one case, we did lose it. We lost it when we lost the Invincible class of carriers.
My hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts), in his magisterial opening speech, referred to the fact that those carriers were termed through-deck cruisers, and he was rather critical of that. This is the only minor point of correction I would make to his exemplary exposition. Those ships were from the outset aircraft carriers capable of enabling the Harrier still to offer fixed-wing coverage from the sea to the land. They were called through-deck cruisers to defeat the adversary—the Treasury. If they had been called carriers from the outset, they would never have been built. [Interruption.] I am glad to see that my hon. Friend accepts that. Once they were safely in commission, and after a respectable number of years, it became possible to reclassify them as aircraft carriers, which is what they were always intended to be.
Of course, we very nearly had no carriers for the Falklands conflict. We only had them, as I say, because of a bit of subterfuge on the part of the admiralty. When it came to the Libya conflict—a disastrously misconceived conflict, as it happens—we had no carrier capability at all. I recall that when the decision was taken to have a gap between the phasing out of the Invincible-class carriers and HMS Queen Elizabeth’s coming into service, we did not anticipate any role for a carrier for 10 years or so. I believe that the Libyan scenario arose after something like 10 months, rather than 10 years. Guess which warship our French allies in that conflict immediately moved to the theatre? It was their one and only aircraft carrier.
Mr Sweeney
The right hon. Gentleman is making a very important point about euphemisms. Another favourite of mine is “capability holiday”, and “fitted for but not with” was a common theme on the Type 45 destroyer. Does he agree that the issue of capability holidays needs to be properly scrutinised? I do not think the Ministry of Defence has recognised the damage that the 2010 SDSR caused, in terms of the loss of maritime patrol capability and carrier capability.
Dr Lewis
The trouble with 2010 was that it was a funded defence review that was totally unstrategic. People say that the 1998 defence review was the reverse: it was very strategic, but almost totally unfunded. Our problem is that we are unable in times of peace to persuade the people in charge of the national purse strings that the best investment they can make in the long term is to have strong armed forces. If our armed forces are strong enough, we will not have to spend all that treasure, let alone all those lives, in fighting conflicts that arise as a result of our perceived weakness.
Robert Courts
My right hon. Friend is making an absolutely outstanding point. Does he agree with this summary of it? We need to have a strategic look at what we want to achieve with our strategic defence goals and then fund them, as opposed to having the funding and then seeing what we can still manage to do.
Dr Lewis
I will go some way towards acknowledging that, with this one caveat: our strategic goals cannot be defined more tightly than the ability to have a full range of military capability to meet whatever threats may reasonably be regarded as likely to arise. I am afraid that all speeches that I make about defence policy and military strategy come back to the same three basic concepts: deterrence, containment and the unpredictability of future conflict. Libya and the Falklands were unpredictable.
The only thing we can predict is that the vast majority of conflicts in which we will be engaged in in the future, as in the vast majority of conflicts in the past, will arise with little or no warning significantly in advance, and that is why we have to have a comprehensive range of military capabilities. It is very difficult to persuade budget-conscious Treasury officials not to take a chance with the nation’s security. That is why the Defence Select Committee comes back time and again to the same point, which is that defence has fallen too far down our scale of national priorities. When we compare it with other high spending Departments we can see that because in the 1980s, at the stage when we faced an aggressive Soviet Union and a major terrorist threat in the form of Northern Ireland and the IRA insurgency, we spent approximately the same on defence as we spent on health and education. Now we spend four times on health and two and a half times on education as we spend on defence. We can get away with that as long as things do not go wrong, but if they do we live to regret it bitterly.
Mr Sweeney
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his indulgence in giving way. Although I do not think the decisions on spending are mutually exclusive—I think we have sufficient capacity in the state to fund all these things adequately—he makes an important point about thinking we can get away with not properly investing. I think of the predecessor of the new Prince of Wales, which was sunk by the Japanese in 1941 because there were fatal weaknesses in the battleship’s design. Its air defence systems had been scrapped because of cost-saving measures in the 1930s. Does he not agree that that is a lesson of history that we ought to probably learn if unpredictable conflicts are to emerge in future?
Dr Lewis
I wondered whether I should make a reference to that terrible event in December 1941 when the Prince of Wales and the Repulse were sunk by Japanese air power. One of the main problems was that they were sent out with inadequate protection and inadequate escorts, and, as I recall from my history books, no air cover whatever. Having said that, we can say that HMS Queen Elizabeth has already claimed one victory. Given that, as I said earlier, the Treasury can be regarded as the main adversary, I think the Treasury has probably sunk more ships in the Royal Navy than any other enemy we have faced. It was gratifying to see a bit of advance retaliation in that HMS Queen Elizabeth appears to have sunk the Chancellor’s visit to the Communist Chinese without even having embarked on its first operational voyage. [Laughter.] I hoped to get a laugh at that point, but behind that is a serious point that relates to what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney a moment ago in an intervention: the Government need to have an overall strategy. All too often they look both ways with regard to countries that do not mean us a lot of good.
Let us take the example of China. Before I come to the more recent issue of its behaviour in the South China sea, let us go back to 2013 when I served on the Intelligence and Security Committee, which devoted a great deal of time to a study of foreign penetration of British critical national infrastructure. That was the overall title of the report that we produced, but in reality it was all about Huawei and the way in which that giant Chinese Communist telecommunications firm had penetrated British telecom and been brought into the system without Ministers having even been alerted until it had happened. I remember being somewhat fazed when, within a matter of a few weeks of the publication of that report, with all its dire warnings about the need for it to never happen again, I saw a picture of the then Prime Minster David Cameron shaking hands with the chief executive of Huawei on the doorstep of No. 10 on the basis of some great new deal that was being proposed.
We need to understand that if there is something so sensitive about the idea that a ship of the Royal Navy could even dream of going into the Pacific ocean that a major trade trip from the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom to China has to be called off, there is something terribly wrong both with the attitude of the Communist Chinese in calling off the trip, as it were, and the attitude of the Treasury in wanting the Chancellor to undertake it. I will leave the point at that at the moment, unless I get some in-flight refuelling from the hon. Gentleman.
Mr Sweeney
Does the right hon. Gentleman think that the concept of ITAR—international traffic in arms regulations—which is a NATO standard, should be extended to such spheres to address the insidiousness of the new penetration by foreign powers?
Dr Lewis
I think that is a very perceptive suggestion. When it comes to the issue of keeping the country safe from threats to our way of life, which now take on new forms that are much more difficult to recognise because they do not operate at a level that would automatically trigger the same sort of alarm bells as traditional military threats, the support that I find as chairman of the Defence Committee from Members of all four parties represented on it is absolutely outstanding. The House should acknowledge more than it does the high degree of consensus among defence-minded people in all the major parties, irrespective of occasional disagreements on specific aspects of defence now and again.
I want to bring my remarks to a conclusion by talking about the 1998 Labour Government strategic defence review, which I described as unfunded but highly strategic. It was a very good review. If the funds had been made available for it, it would have been an outstanding success. At that time in 1998 the threat from the Soviet Union had gone away and it was hoped that we would not have to consider a major confrontation in Europe. So the thinking behind that review went something like this: given that we do not anticipate our armed forces having to be engaged in the European theatre in future, it follows that if they are to be engaged on a significant scale anywhere, it will be at some considerable distance from Europe. Given that we no longer are a global imperial power with a network of strategic bases around the world from which to intervene, it follows that we need a concept that enables us to have a movable strategic base. At the heart of that strategic defence review of 1998 was the concept of the sea base, which had two central pillars. One was carrier strike and the other was the amphibious taskforce.
Carrier strike was to enable us to exert air power to the land from the sea, and the amphibious taskforce was to enable us to insert land forces on to territory likewise from the sea, taking the whole strategic concept into a way in which we could travel to the theatre where the need to intervene militarily applied.
Only a year ago we faced yet another major potential crisis. It was widely reported in January last year that the core ships—HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark of the amphibious taskforce—were going to be pensioned off 15 years before their due date. I can honestly say that the most influential report of the 27 so far produced by the Defence Committee since I have been chairing it was the one that we brought out in February 2018, which described the proposal to lose our ability to exert land power from the sea as militarily illiterate. I absolutely welcome the intervention of the Secretary of State for Defence, who could see the risk and what was going to happen. Some people have criticised the modernising defence programme for not being been quite as substantial as they expected. However, that is to miss the point, because although I welcome the concept of the fusion doctrine, which my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed referred to, there was a way in which it posed a risk to the future of our armed forces. The way in which the defence theory for the future was being amalgamated in the national security capability review with newer threats, such as those from cyberspace and disinformation, was conceptually sound but economically dangerous. I shall explain after taking an intervention from my hon. Friend.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
On that point, the great challenge of the fusion doctrine, whose strategic vision is really intelligent, as my right hon. Friend says, is that, as ever—it is difficult to say out loud—the adversary in the Treasury and those who were in my view driving the policy forward saw it as an opportunity to take hold of the defence budget and bring it into a greater whole, without fully understanding the need for hard power to remain in our national picture.
Dr Lewis
I am delighted with that intervention, which has saved me at least the next two paragraphs of what I was going to say. That was precisely the danger. The defence budget was being wrapped up inside an overall defence and security budget and we were being told that that national security capability review would have to be fiscally neutral. So effectively, if £56 billion was going to be put together overall, and if more money was to be spent to meet the new sorts of threats we are constantly told about—threats in space or cyberspace, or threats of disinformation that are not really new but are moving into new dimensions—every £1 received for those threats would mean £1 less for the Army, the Royal Navy or the Royal Air Force. That is why there were leaks— clearly authoritative—about potential cuts in each service, including about the loss of HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark, which would have happened if the Secretary of State for Defence had not fought and won the political battle to strip out the defence elements from the national security capability review and have a separate modernising defence programme. That meant that he was no longer caught in that fiscal or financial ambush.
Let us not be too complacent in congratulating ourselves on the advent of such marvellous vessels, because they very nearly did not happen, first because of the Treasury, back in 2009-10, and secondly because even as we brought in half the concept of the sea base—carrier strike—we were in danger, right up to a few months ago, of losing the other half of the concept. That was amphibious capability, without which we would not have a rounded overall capability to intervene strategically in whatever theatre of the world a threat might arise unpredictably. Believe me, when a threat arises in the future, it will be unpredictable and we will be lucky if we are sufficiently equipped to meet it. That luck depends on the advocacy of people such as those we have heard from this afternoon, in every party represented in the debate. I hope that my hon. Friend who speaks for the Scottish National Party, the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes), will presently make a speech and keep up the tradition.
Mark Lancaster
I think my comments demonstrate that we are well placed to renew this capability in the Royal Navy and, crucially, how well placed we are—a point made by several hon. Members—to ensure that we have interoperability with our closest allies.
Carrier strike not only offers political and military advantage to Her Majesty’s Government and our allies, but provides significant benefit to the UK industry. Before I get on to the industry element, I will touch on strategy, because the point was raised by several hon. Members. I gave one example to the hon. Member for Gedling of how the Government are genuinely trying to bring a cross-Whitehall approach to formulating strategies in this area. That is something we have already been doing with carrier; as I have already said, the past five years have been getting us to this point. We now have a cross-Whitehall strategy being formed about how exactly we should use this asset.
Of course, that all cascades down from the formation of the National Security Council in 2010, which brought together for the first time the different strands of Government to try to make the very decisions that hon. Members have rightly said we should be considering. The framework is in place and, of course, as we move forward through operations and gain experience, it will be refined.
With regard to industry, the Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers have been built over six locations, involving over 10,000 people, in addition to 800 apprentices and 700 businesses and suppliers. This includes 7,000 to 8,000 jobs at the tier 1 shipyards around the UK, plus a further 2,000 to 3,000 people across the UK supply chain. UK industry also provides approximately 15% by value of each of the 3,000 Lightning aircraft scheduled to be built over the life of the programme. That will potentially create a £35 billion net contribution to the UK economy and up to 25,000 jobs in the UK.
In addition, the UK’s role as a key partner in the global F-35 programme was reaffirmed earlier this month, with the announcement of a major boost to the F-35 avionic and aircraft component repair hub, which was awarded a second major assignment of work, worth some £500 million, by the US Department of Defence. This is an excellent outcome and will support hundreds of additional F-35 jobs in the UK, many of them at the MOD’s Defence and Electronics Components Agency at MOD Sealand in North Wales, where the majority of the work will be carried out. It will involve crucial maintenance, repair, overhaul and upgrade services for an even wider range of F-35 avionic, electronic and electrical systems for hundreds of F-35 aircraft based globally.
The hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Sweeney) talked at length and with great, detailed knowledge about the impact and the tempo, if you like, of not losing skillsets, and about the relationship between Government and industry. I accept that he does not support many of the recommendations of the national shipbuilding strategy. Owing to the scope of the debate, I will not get into the procurement of fleet solid support ships, or that relationship. However, as he probably spotted in February, Sir John Parker announced that he will undertake a review of that strategy, which is due to report later this year. I hope that that demonstrates to the hon. Gentleman that, while I support the strategy, we are not dogmatic in our approach to it, and that we are prepared to review the strategy one year on to see how it is bedding in. He made some important points.
Dr Julian Lewis
On fleet solid support ships, we on the Defence Committee are a little bit worried that it is being presented to us and to the country that the Government have no choice but to run a competition. However, other countries, such as France, have built such ships without running competitions, and have classed them as warships. We worry about what, for example, Rosyth dockyard will do between the completion of the Prince of Wales and the first refit of the Queen Elizabeth. Building such ships would be a perfect way of maintaining that capability. We hope these wider considerations are being taken into account.
Mark Lancaster
Indeed; that is a perfectly reasonable point. My right hon. Friend wrote to the Minister with responsibility for defence procurement, my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), with many of these questions on 26 February. Hopefully he now has a reply, because the Minister replied yesterday.
Mark Lancaster
In that case, without going through the letter, I assure my right hon. Friend that it answers his questions, so far as I am concerned.
My hon. Friend the Member for Witney made several interesting points, not least in highlighting the historical necessity of carriers and—to my mind, as a Defence Minister—about historical SDSRs, with some being strategic and some effectively being written to budget. Rarely do those two factors meet. Getting that right in the future is absolutely key.
Carrier strike provides a new conventional strategic deterrent for the nation, and is a powerful manifestation of Britain’s desire to reach out to the world as a nation that remains a global player. It provides Her Majesty’s Government choice in exercising influence through coercive power, as well as being an effective tool to reassure our allies around the world. We must continue to innovate with the world-class capabilities of the Queen Elizabeth aircraft carriers, the F-35B Lightning and Crowsnest to ensure our competitive advantage, and to increase their interoperability with our partners’ capabilities. Doing so will ensure that this 50-year capability remains potent into the second half of the 21st century. I am conscious that there were a few detailed questions that I have not addressed. I will look at the record of Hansard and endeavour to write to hon. Members.
Oral Answers to Questions
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Gavin Williamson
It is a whole community that delivers the Tornado’s fighting capability. In countless conflicts around the globe—be it the first Gulf war, the second Gulf war, or taking the fight to Daesh over the skies of Iraq and Syria—the Tornados have been at the forefront, and the pilots, navigators and ground crew have all been part of it. RAF Marham has an exciting future, however, with the two new F-35 squadrons and the additional training squadron.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mark Lancaster)
Three Phalanx close-in weapon systems will be fitted to each new aircraft carrier. Two are being fitted to HMS Queen Elizabeth during her current capability insertion period, with the third to be fitted towards the end of 2020. Three will be fitted to HMS Prince Of Wales in 2020.
Dr Lewis
May I add to the tributes to Paul Flynn by noting the remarkable physical courage he showed in battling crippling arthritis over many years?
In relation to the Phalanx systems on the aircraft carriers, I agree that, if nothing goes wrong, the fitting of three will offer 360° coverage and protection, but, given that there is a fourth station on each aircraft carrier that could take a fourth system, and given that there are spare systems in storage following withdrawal from operational theatres, would it not be sensible to give some extra insurance by fitting a fourth system, so that if one is lost, there will still be total coverage and protection for these vital naval assets?
Mark Lancaster
My right hon. Friend is, of course, right in his assessment that three Phalanx systems offer a 360° capability, and that there is scope, potentially, for a fourth. We have the ability to adjust that according to the threat. I should also remind the House that the carrier will be at the centre of a carrier group. Protection for that carrier will consist of different layers of security provided by both the frigates and the destroyers, so it will not rely solely on the Phalanx system.
Gavin Williamson
What we set out in our negotiations with the European Union is the opportunity for Britain to opt into various programmes if it is in our national interest to do so. But it still keeps coming down to the most important point: what delivers our security in Europe is not the European Union; it is NATO. It is that framework that will continue to deliver that security.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Defence (Gavin Williamson)
I announced to NATO Defence Ministers last Wednesday a significant increase in our commitment to the alliance, making the UK contribution to the enhanced forward presence in Estonia the largest of any nation. At the Munich security conference, I met counterparts from the global coalition of countries tasked with defeating Daesh, and in Norway, I had the opportunity to further our discussions with the Norwegian Government about how we can enhance our security in the high north.
Dr Lewis
The Secretary of State is far too modest: I was sure he was going to tell us about his dip in the icy Norwegian waters.
On a very much more serious issue, the Secretary of State knows that there are between 200 and 300 war widows who lost their war widows pension on remarriage and who, if they were to divorce or lose their husbands now would have it restored and it could not then be taken away, but who have not had it restored and are therefore in the perverse situation that if they want to get quite a few thousand pounds a year more, they should divorce and remarry their husbands. Everyone agrees that that is an absurd and indeed disgraceful situation, and I know that the Secretary of State wants to do something about it. The war widows have been to see the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, and she has expressed sympathy. When will this matter be dealt with? What is holding it up?
Gavin Williamson
The next time I go to Norway, I will be sure to bring my right hon. Friend along so that we can go for a dip together.
My right hon. Friend raises an important issue, and it is one that has been ongoing for a very long time. I have had the opportunity to meet a large number of those affected, and we are keen to work across the Government to find a solution. This is a burning injustice, and I know that those women feel it very deeply. I am committed to finding a solution, and I very much hope that we can deliver that across all Departments.
Oral Answers to Questions
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 3 months ago)
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Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The Ministry of Defence is evidently well prepared to respond very quickly to drone threats, once it is asked for assistance, but can the Minister explain the policy whereby installations are not already in place and a crisis has to arise before that assistance is deployed to the airports?
Stuart Andrew
As I was saying, the protection of airports is in fact an issue for those airports. I know that the Department for Transport is working with airfields across the country to ensure that they have the protections they need. The response by the MOD was incredibly swift, and I pay tribute to it for that.
Royal Marines: Basing Arrangements
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Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
It is time to put an end to the uncertainty over where our Royal Marines will be based in the future. At the outset, I pay tribute to all those who serve in the Royal Marines. As the UK’s high-readiness, elite amphibious fighting force, they offer the UK hard power options when diplomacy fails and when disasters strike. Their contribution to our country has been delivered in blood and sweat, and I want to thank the Royal Marines in uniform today; those veterans who have served for their contribution to our national security; and forces families for their support for those who have served.
Tonight I want to focus specifically on the Royal Marines base in Stonehouse in Plymouth. In 2016 it was announced that this historic and spiritual home of the Royal Marines would close in 2023, but three years on we are still not certain where the Royal Marines will move to when Stonehouse barracks close.
This is not the first debate today about the Royal Marines. Earlier my fellow Devon MP, the hon. Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones), made the case to keep open the Royal Marines base at Chivenor. MPs with Royal Marines on their patches are not fighting among ourselves; indeed, there is agreement that we need certainty for the Royal Marines’ long-term future, wherever that may be. Certainty is required for 40 Commando in Taunton, as well as for those Royal Marines at Chivenor and those in Stonehouse. As the Member of Parliament for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, I am proud to make the case for the Royal Marines—the pride and joy of our armed forces—to continue to be based in Plymouth, their spiritual home for more than 300 years.
We all know that the Royal Marines are the UK’s finest fighting force, with unique and valued capabilities. I have seen that for myself at the Commando training centre at Lympstone, with the commando obstacle course and at passing out parades. I have seen it in Plymouth, with the Royal Marines at Stonehouse, the Royal Marines band school in Portsmouth, and, on a rather blustery day, on the back of an offshore raiding craft on the River Tamar with Royal Marines from 1 Assault Group.
It is with great regret that I say that the morale of our Royal Marines is suffering, in part due to the uncertainty about their future basing. I know that from speaking to many of them off duty in bars around Plymouth and while door knocking in my city. The latest annual armed forces continuous attitude survey suggests there has been a significant fall in morale across the services. Two years ago, 62% of Royal Marines officers rated morale in the service as high; now, that figure is just 23%.
Since 2010, Plymouth has been on the hard end of cuts to our Royal Navy and Royal Marines. With the cuts to 42 Commando, the loss of the Royal Citadel and the sale of our Royal Navy flagship, HMS Ocean, at a bargain price to Brazil, Ministers have cut more often than they have invested. That must not be the end of the story for the Royal Marines and their long and proud association with Plymouth.
Talk of further cuts continued last summer, when there was speculation that Devonport-based amphibious ships HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark could face the axe, too. If those cuts had gone ahead, there would have been a logical threat to the existence of the Royal Marines. Rumours last April that the Marines might be merged with the Paras only added to concerns that that was being lined up as a real possibility. Time after time, I have stood up in this place to demand answers but, unfortunately, Ministers have refused to rule out the loss of those capabilities. The petition I launched to preserve the amphibious ships and the Royal Marines attracted 30,000 names, the bulk of them from the far south-west.
I am pleased to say, though, that in September, after a long, hard-fought campaign, we were relieved to hear that the Government had decided to save HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark. That was the right decision, and I thank the Minister for championing those ships and the Royal Marines.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for his work on saving our amphibious capability; I think he would acknowledge the work the Select Committee on Defence did, too. Does he agree that we all should acknowledge the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), who is another local MP, and the willingness of the Defence Secretary to take on board the message we were trying to relay? He even announced his decision ahead of the modernising defence programme announcement—at the Conservative party conference, no less.
Luke Pollard
Sadly, I did not get an invitation to the Tory party conference this year. I appreciate the point that the Chair of the Defence Committee makes. Our campaigns as a city are best fought when they are cross-party, and I hope that in the future the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) will be here to make the case, too.
Stonehouse barracks is the oldest operational military barracks in the country. Since the Corps of Royal Marines was formed in 1664, it has had a base in Plymouth, close to Devonport. Stonehouse barracks, which opened in 1756, was the Royal Marines’ first ever dedicated and purpose-built barracks. There were similar barracks in Chatham and Portsmouth, but Stonehouse is the only one remaining.
Since world war two, Stonehouse has been home to elements of 41, 42 and 43 Commando, and it was home to 45 Commando until it moved to RM Condor in 1971, when Stonehouse became the headquarters of 3 Commando Brigade. I am pleased that the Minister confirmed yesterday that Condor is safe; I hope he will have similar good news in due course for the rest of the Royal Marines bases.
The estate optimisation strategy, “A Better Defence Estate”, which was published in November 2016, announced the Ministry of Defence’s intent to
“dispose of Stonehouse Barracks by 2023 and to reprovide for the Royal Marines units in either the Plymouth or Torpoint areas”.
The promise to provide a “super-base” in Plymouth is much touted by Government Members, and I believe it is a good one, but we have seen little evidence of where that base will be built. As part of a major defence shake-up, the Army’s 29 Commando will also leave Plymouth’s Royal Citadel, which the MOD leases from the Crown Estate. In answer to a parliamentary question a few months ago, I was told:
“Further assessment study work is being undertaken to inform the final decision.”
It is right that decisions about basing are taken on the grounds of military strategy by those in uniform rather than for party political reasons, but Ministers need to take a decision to address the uncertainty.
RMB Chivenor: Planned Closure
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Tobias Ellwood)
It is a pleasure to respond to the debate. As is customary, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones) on securing the debate in Westminster Hall and on what he has done to represent his constituents and the armed forces by passionately making a case, lobbying and campaigning to get answers and discover what will happen to an important asset for our defence posture. He will be aware that the base sits in a wider frame of more than 90 sites that are being considered, and that there is a programme—a timetable—for us to release the news, for understandable commercial reasons. I will expand on that later. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s work and I thank him for the invitation to visit Chivenor. I was hugely impressed by what I saw there and that has very much influenced the decisions that I hope to expand on later.
My hon. Friend spoke about the role that military bases have, not just as important defence assets but as sizeable communities that provide homes, jobs and a way of life, and whose supply chains link with the local economy. They are a living organism that has a symbiotic relationship with the wider community. The base—the garrison or whichever military establishment it sits in—develops a bond with the local community, as is the case with Chivenor, as he described.
Many of our military establishments have been in a place for so long that they help to define the area and add to its reputation, so it is always with some trepidation that any Defence Minister would try to tamper with or affect the size or longevity of a garrison, fully appreciating the strength of feeling and pride that local communities have for our military. A local bond is developed with service personnel and it is understandable that hon. Members would wish to ensure the long-term future of military bases in their constituencies, but hon. Members will also be aware of the wider need to rationalise our defence real estate.
The MOD owns 3% of the UK. We need to spend our limited defence budget—as much as I would like it to rise—wisely. It is simply not possible to retain in perpetuity that huge defence real estate, which is a legacy of the sea, land and air assets required to fight two world wars. We have been advised to conduct a wide-ranging study into MOD land, with a view to transforming our estate into one that better supports the future needs of our armed forces. With that comes more bespoke investment. We will be investing more than £4 billion in the next 10 years to create smaller, more modern and capability-focused bases and garrisons. I hope that hon. Members understand that it is important for such studies to be led by the armed forces, taking into account the issues and views of stakeholders.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The Minister has done more than most to flag up the need for more investment in defence. Can he assure us that, where contraction takes place for the reasons that he has explained, contingency plans are in place so that, if this country should regrettably ever find itself involved in a major conflict, expansion could equally easily occur?
Mr Ellwood
My right hon. Friend, who is the Chair of the Defence Committee, makes such an important point. That is why Chivenor is interesting, because it has an airstrip, which is built on a flood plain. Do we want to lose that asset? We saw what happened at Heathrow yesterday. If things actually go in the direction that he suggests, it is important that we choose wisely which parts of our real estate that we close down and which parts we might need in the near or long-term future.
Modernising Defence Programme
Julian Lewis Excerpts(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
There is much interest in this statement, but I point out to the House that there is a Standing Order No. 24 debate to follow and then the Second Reading of a Bill. There is, therefore, a premium upon brevity and I am keen to move on at, or extremely close to, two o’clock. Some people might not get in on this statement.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Very briefly in that case, Mr Speaker, does the Secretary of State accept that as we have not seen the actual document it would be useful to have a debate at an early stage? Will he accept the thanks, I think, of the whole House for having saved the amphibious capability of the Royal Marines? Does he feel, in this era of slightly looser Cabinet joint collective responsibility or whatever they care to call it, that he might accept the fact that the Defence Committee’s target ultimately of a return to 3% of GDP is what is really needed in terms of defence expenditure?
Gavin Williamson
My right hon. Friend always tries to tempt me with that question. I read his report with interest. He makes a point about an early debate. That would certainly be very welcome. I will make representations to the usual channels to see if that can be granted.
Oral Answers to Questions
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Gavin Williamson
There is one nation that is in breach of the treaty, and it is Russia. It needs to start complying with that treaty, and it needs to comply immediately. It is a treaty between those two nations, and currently there is one nation that is not complying with it.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty of 1987 was based on the zero-option offer, which was a great two-sided deal between the Soviet Union and the west. Does the Secretary of State think that there are any lessons to be drawn from the negotiations which led to that successful deal, in that the west faced down the Soviet Union, walked out—or, at least, allowed the Soviet Union to walk out—without a deal when the Russians refused to accept the zero-option offer, and waited for them to come back and do a genuine deal that benefited both sides? Does he think that that successful two-sided deal has any lessons to teach us for the purpose of certain other negotiations that have so far worked out a lot less happily?
Gavin Williamson
I cannot imagine what my right hon. Friend is referring to, but I think that when it comes to the issue of Russia’s lack of compliance with its treaty obligations, we need to keep hammering home the message, with all our NATO allies, that it cannot ignore its treaty obligations and must start complying with them.
Stuart Andrew
As I have said before, we now have a national shipbuilding strategy that is ensuring that our shipbuilding industry knows exactly what the MOD will be building over the next 30 years so that it can plan accordingly and be competitive in the world market. Surely, we should be welcoming that.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
May I give the Minister a second chance to answer the question that he could not hear earlier about veterans being given the opportunity to revisit the battlefields on which they have fought?
Mr Ellwood
It is important that we give veterans the opportunity to return to the battlefields. I think that my right hon. Friend is referring to a return to the Falklands. I will endeavour to see what can be done, and whether we can use the air bridge to allow veterans to return to that battle place.