Defence Transformation

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Dr Fox]

That was one of the poorest attacks on a Government that I have ever heard. It is pretty rich for the Opposition, after calling for the statement for so long, to complain when we make it. They also seem to be utterly incapable of understanding, even now, the appalling financial state in which they left not only defence but the United Kingdom in general. Does the right hon. Gentleman really think that had we been given a choice—had we not faced a national economic emergency—we would be making spending reductions across the board? We are having to do that because of the mess that the Opposition left behind.

When it comes to numbers, yet again the Opposition seem not to have learned any lessons. They talk about total numbers all the time, but they do not talk about deployability. Yet again they have failed to learn the lessons of the mistakes that they made during their time in office. I want to see British forces that can be deployed better, and I want to see them better trained and properly equipped. When they talk about how much they value the TA, the Opposition would do well to remember that it was they who were cutting the reserves during their last months in office. It was they who were cutting reservists’ training and allowances to save small amounts of money. We do not need any lessons from them in that regard.

We are trying to augment the “one Army” concept by ensuring better interoperability between our reserves and our regular forces. We want our reserves, like those in other countries, to be properly used in a way that gives good value for the investment made in them, and gives them a greater say and more respect within the military family.

Investment had already been made in Leuchars, and I fully accept that some of that investment will be lost. However, we felt that—in the broader scheme of things, and if we were to achieve a better rationalisation of the estate—Lossiemouth was the better choice, given that we had an alternative for Leuchars in the form of investment in the Army in the south of Scotland.

The right hon. Gentleman asked about the footprint in Scotland. I should be happy to look at our footprint across the United Kingdom. What we have done is return to Scotland a footprint that is much more akin to what was there when we left office than to what was there when we returned to it.

[Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

I warmly congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on his important and impressive announcement. Contrary to what the right hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Mr Murphy) said, the Army will discover that the RAF bases into which it moves are very much better found than it is used to. Does the Secretary of State agree that the transformation and whole reform of the defence structure needs to proceed at a great pace, otherwise the rats at the Ministry of Defence will get at it?

[Dr Fox]

I would like to say that I am rat-proof, but that would probably be tempting fate. We have set out a path that we will clearly follow, from the defence reform set out by Lord Levene, through the basing review, which we have set out today, and through the reserves review and the extra investment that goes with that. It is correct that some of that will have to proceed quickly, but it is also correct that some of it can occur only if other steps are met. For example, the assumptions we make about Future Force 2020 and the size of the regular reserve ratio will depend on two things: that we ensure that the training and equipping of the reserves goes to the plan I have set out, and that we withdraw from Afghanistan in the time scale the Prime Minister has set out.