Defence Policy (International Relations and Defence Committee Report)

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Friday 30th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Baroness Goldie) (Con)]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to speak in the House when we debate such a thorough, well-informed report as this one from the International Relations and Defence Committee. It is a privilege to follow such knowledgeable and distinguished contributors. Debates in this House are always immeasurably enhanced by the breadth of experience of those who have been not just Ministers in the midst of some of our nation’s greatest challenges but diplomats in the world’s great capital cities and military commanders in the most hazardous of conditions. I thank all those who have participated; I extend a special note of gratitude to my noble friend Lady Anelay of St Johns and her committee for their diligence and acuity in producing such an interesting report.

I think I had better deal with the elephant in the room, which was referred to by all your Lordships: the disquiet about a perceived inadequacy of opportunity to debate these issues in this Chamber. All I can observe is that I recall having the pleasure of a full debate in which I and my noble friend Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon participated. If I recall correctly, he opened the debate and I wound it up, although it may have been the other way around; in any case, I remember that we both thought it a very fertile debate. I observe to your Lordships that there are usual channels, which can heavily influence calls for debates on issues of interest or concern to the House. Parties can table their own debates. Both in the other place and in this Chamber, Ministers have consistently been called to account by numerous Chamber appearance. For my own part, these have tended to be responding to either Statements, as the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, observed, or Oral Questions, which may be topical or Urgent Questions. These have a particularly abrasive character in terms of the Minister’s anxiety about being able to respond accurately and fully; they are representative of a fluid character of business whereby such questions can address topicality and currency. Ministers can then assist, perhaps, in giving the most up-to-date presentation of information and engagement possible. I will take noble Lords’ comments back to my noble friends the Leader of the House and the Chief Whip.

Before I respond to many of the excellent points that we have heard today, it is worth reflecting once more on the context that frames our discussions. Inevitably, with the conflict in Ukraine, this debate takes place in an all-encompassing environment of threat; hence my presence at the Dispatch Box today as an MoD Minister.

The underlying assumptions of our integrated review back in 2021 proved correct; it established Russia as our most acute threat and showed that our decision to train Ukrainians back in 2015 was prescient. However, it would also be true to say that a degree of cognitive dissonance prevailed. For all of Putin’s belligerence, we still hoped against hope that the Russian threat would not materialise and that the pace of competition outlined in IR21 would not accelerate.

Putin’s decision to send tanks into Ukraine last February sent shockwaves around the world. We understood immediately that this was more than an illegal invasion of a sovereign nation. It was an assault on the established open international order, an affront to human rights and a taunt to the West. Putin believed that he could simply roll over Ukraine and the West would not act.

In the event, Putin could not have been more wrong. The Ukrainians have shown extraordinary, superhuman levels of courage, and the international community, barring the usual suspects, has displayed remarkable unanimity. The UK, alongside our great US friends, has displayed exemplary leadership, galvanising the global response, providing lethal and non-lethal aid, training more than 17,700 new Ukrainian recruits alongside our partner nations since last June, and ensuring that international donations keep rolling in. I thank my noble friend Lady Anelay and the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, for recognising that response.

However, there is no disguising that the world as we knew it has mutated. The last vestiges of Cold War optimism have dissipated in a fuselage of missiles and brutality. In this new age, where uncertainty lurks around every corner, we cannot afford any misjudgments, because the threat is multiplying.

As Prigozhin’s attempted coup last week reminded us, the situation is febrile. Already, the ramifications of Russia’s illegal invasion have spread far beyond the borders of Ukraine. Russia is co-operating with Iran and North Korea. It has a no-limits partnership with China, which is itself increasingly assertive and poses an enduring and epoch-defining challenge. Russia’s actions have triggered an energy crisis, a food crisis, and a cost of living crisis. All the while, extremist actors continue to agitate across the world and, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, correctly said, climate change exacerbates instability.

Our integrated review refresh, which was published subsequent to the committee’s report earlier this year and aligned with many of the report’s recommendations, was a response to this perfect storm. Work to update the integrated review was under way the moment Russian boots stepped across the border. Defence fully endorses the conclusions of the integrated review refresh. The Government’s most urgent foreign policy priority is to address the Russian threat to European security. We are working with allies across the world to impose our toughest-ever sanctions regime to provide huge quantities of military aid and rebuild our stockpiles and munitions.

We must maintain this momentum. Putin is convinced that the West does not have the stomach for this fight. We must show him he is wrong, which is why we are doubling down on our support for Ukraine; we have already committed a further £2.3 billion in the next financial year.

The MoD also has a much wider role to play in delivering each of the critical pillars of the strategic review refresh. I remind your Lordships that this is about shaping the international framework, generating strategic advantage, addressing vulnerabilities, and ensuring that we can deter, defend and compete across all domains. That is why we are refreshing our 2021 Defence Command Paper. I can inform your Lordships that this has been an intensive process. It has been under way for several months. It has involved extensive consultation with academia, industry and think tanks. The paper is still under wraps but its general conclusions, which I break no confidences in summarising, will come as no surprise to perspicacious colleagues; indeed, some of your Lordships may very well have helped to shape them.

The Command Paper will enshrine Defence’s mission to protect the nation and help it prosper. Having contributed to the paper myself, I would like to highlight three themes in particular: readiness, resilience and relationships. All the contributions have touched on these in some respect. My noble friend Lady Anelay referred to readiness, as did the noble Lord, Lord Collins, who shrewdly identified that you cannot leave readiness in a silo. It is inevitably caught up with resilience and the need for agility, pace and response.

To head off danger at the pass, Defence will need to operate more persistently and proactively across the globe. Greater readiness will in turn demand greater integration across Whitehall and across all the domains: not just land, sea and air, but space and cyber. Our object is not simply to enhance our deterrence and situation awareness but to enable faster decision-making and leverage our diplomatic and economic muscle as well as military might. Indeed, we are currently creating a digital ecosystem to rapidly assimilate and harness the data we receive from a myriad of sensors across multiple domains. Your Lordships may think that “digital ecosystems” sounds like trendy jargon, but in a nutshell it is about making data and information the drivers of decision-making.

That brings me to resilience, because our forthcoming Command Paper will underscore the need for greater resilience. To operate effectively in a more contested world, we must change the way the MoD functions. Our structures, processes and ways of working must accelerate efficiency, efficacy and delivered effect, to give us an edge. We expect ever more from our people, by which I mean our whole force of regulars and reservists, uniformed and civilians, government and industry, apprentices and contractors; veterans also play a role. We have to look after them and help develop their skills and maximise their potential.

My noble friend Lady Anelay and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup, also raised the role of industry in relation to resilience. The conflict in Ukraine has exposed the vulnerabilities of a completely globalised free market. It has underlined the importance of stockpiles of munitions and other essential capability, and has shown us the need to shore up our supply chains. That is why we are now looking at how to de-risk our industries so that we are less reliant on others to provide us with critical minerals and semiconductors. I reassure your Lordships that significant orders have now been placed for replenishment.

That brings me to relationships. The third principle of our Defence Command Paper will relate to being international by design. Only by deepening friendships and weaving together a tapestry of partners and allies can we collectively secure our populations and interests. We have seen the value of international unity in Ukraine, an effort that has proven more enduring and robust than many, not least Putin, predicted.

My noble friend Lady Anelay, along with my noble friend Lord Cormack and others, raised the matter of the EU. I can perhaps offer a reassuring counterbalance here. There is no doubt that during the anguish of the Brexit process, relations with the EU were difficult and fractious, but I detect a dramatic improvement. Even at the most difficult time of tensions, within the MoD, we had constructive cordial relationships with professionals and counterparts in other EU countries. That was very important. Post Brexit, I am delighted to say that there is now a new warmth in relationships. There was reference to PESCO; I can add to that that there are very strong bilateral relationships on defence between the UK and EU countries.

I had the privilege of attending the EI2 defence group of countries. What is interesting is that 10 of these are EU members and two are not; one is the UK and the other is Norway. I cannot overstate to your Lordships the warmth of the reception that I received, the interest in what the UK was doing and the desire to engage and share experiences and knowledge.

We have also rediscovered, because of the conflict in Ukraine, the value of decisive leadership. Whenever one nation has put its head above the parapet, others have followed. That aggregate effect is having a huge impact. We have watched NATO come into its own: more united, more resilient and, with the accession of Finland and eventually Sweden, stronger than ever before. Not one Russian boot has entered NATO territory.

Our adversaries act globally. They act from the Indo-Pacific to west Africa, as has been indicated, and from Latin America to the high north, as was also mentioned. We have to compete globally too. In relation to the Indo-Pacific, which a number of noble Lords raised, perhaps with an air of concern, the Prime Minister said recently that Atlantic and Pacific security was indivisible. He was absolutely correct, for a variety of reasons, so it has been encouraging to see nations outside of NATO drawing the same conclusions and uniting to defend the international order.

There is another important strand to relationships: how we optimise our HM Government strengths. From my engagement with other countries on defence matters, one example is a seamless tandem between our diplomatic presence and in-country defence attachés. I cannot overestimate or overdescribe the importance of that relationship because, where their activity is mutually comprehensive, the aggregate effect is potent; it really packs a punch. The noble Lord, Lord Boateng, spoke very powerfully on that issue and I would seek to reassure him on that.

A Command Paper will chart defence’s course in the decades ahead. There will remain many issues to be worked through. Noble Lords have identified a number of those challenges today and I will try to address them in the time available. I am probably not going to manage it, in which case I will offer to write.

A number of noble Lords, not least my noble friend Lady Anelay, asked whether we would update the defence and security industrial strategy, the DSIS. It has been reviewed, alongside the IR and DCPR. We will outline further how the Government will deliver that defence, security and industrial strategy.

On defence procurement, I was speaking to a lunch yesterday of stellar presences—or was it the day before?—from the worlds of defence and diplomatic activity. Unsurprisingly, some of your Lordships were there. A diplomat said to me that MoD procurement had not been a series of unmitigated triumphs. I said to him that that was the best diplomatic-speak I had heard in a long time—because it has not been.

We have learned painful lessons, for a variety of reasons. We have been exposed to scrutiny by the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee. We have been exposed to—unwelcome at times—media investigation. We have certainly been exposed to parliamentary scrutiny. All of that has had a galvanizing effect. There is a seismic change in defence, and I will describe some of that in a moment.

On the very interesting point of how we deal, not so much with the primes but with the small or medium-sized enterprises, I am pleased to say that I was having a discussion about this with our director of general industry, trade and economic security in defence, a marvellous woman, Avril Jolliffe. She is absolutely on the ball on this. We see opportunities where we think we can do more on that front and hopefully provide greater encouragement to these smaller presences.

Specifically on the Ajax contract, the Sheldon review was a very helpful commentary on what had been happening. We have already introduced a number of significant changes within the Army. There will be an additional £70 million over 10 years to resource Army programmes and an increased number of senior responsible owners to match its portfolio. Importantly, senior responsible owners are now going to have to spend at least 50% of their time dedicated to the programme. There was an unwelcome churn on previous programme procurements, and it was not healthy. The Army currently has half of its SROs working 100% on its programmes, and that includes the SRO for the armoured cavalry programme that is delivering Ajax.

So I hope I can reassure noble Lords that big changes have taken place. There is also a recognition of the crucial importance of effective sustainment of operations, highlighting the need for sufficient stockpiles and munitions. That is being underpinned by a resilient economic and industrial base at home.

A number of noble Lords raised matters in the Middle East and China. The Middle East is critical to Euro-Atlantic security and prosperity. We recognise that significance and we maintain an enduring presence in the Gulf. We have strong relationships with each of the six countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council. The MoD has been playing its role in supporting that, as your Lordships will be aware, with the presence of naval assets.

The noble Lord, Lord Robertson, raised the matter of the Arctic and the high north. It is significant, as new routes are opening up with climate change. The MoD has now published its Arctic strategy. I commend it to the noble Lord; I think it makes for interesting reading.

A number of your Lordships, including my noble friend Lord Howell, the noble Baronesses, Lady Falkner of Margravine and Lady Smith of Newnham, and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, raised very important points on China. The IR23 refresh identifies the character of the threat posed by China. That is why we will pursue a policy through three interrelated strands, which runs through the IR23 framework. We will protect the UK and align and deepen our co-operation and increase alignment with our core allies and a broader group of partners, but we will also engage directly with China bilaterally and in international fora to preserve and create space for open, constructive, predictable and stable relations that reflect China’s importance in world affairs. To reassure your Lordships, the Government are backing this; there will be double funding—£3.2 million over the next two years—to build China capabilities across government so that we better understand the country. That will enable us to engage confidently when it is in our interest to do so.

The noble Lord, Lord Robertson, and my noble friend Lady Helic spoke eloquently and with great knowledge about the western Balkans. My noble friend raised significant issues and rightly identified inherent and potential threats. She makes a powerful point about prevention; the strategy of the UK and our partners and allies, not least in NATO, is to keep that objective at the forefront of our thinking. The MoD is actively supporting countries in the western Balkans to make progress towards democratic values and greater integration through building resilience in their defence and security institutions. There is a persistent FCDO engagement. Very recently, my noble friend Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, the FCDO Minister in the Lords, and I were discussing what we might do to assist the UK endeavour. On Bosnia and EUFOR, we recognise the importance of the EUFOR peace stabilisation mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina. We will explore how we can best support that initiative.

A number of your Lordships, including the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup, and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, raised issues around the Indo-Pacific. I have indicated how our MoD attitude to the Indo-Pacific is strategically robust and inherent within our attitude to the broader security of the United Kingdom. Noble Lords will be aware that there has been consistent activity out in that region. That is a good combination and a demonstration of soft and hard power where we have assets. I have been out in that region visiting various countries in south-east Asia; the amalgam of the diplomatic presence and the defence attaché presence has absolutely opened doors I would not otherwise ever have got through. There is very useful activity going on there.

The noble Lord, Lord Boateng, raised scholarships for Caribbean servicepeople at the Royal Military Academy and at Dartmouth. I will write to the noble Lord on that issue.

Along with the noble Lord, Lord Alton, the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, raised Wagner, which is a repugnant entity. I believe that sanctions have been imposed on some identified personnel. We have to approach its activity, particularly in Africa, with a mixture of diplomatic and MoD activity in conjunction with partners. We are very clear about the need to ensure that Wagner’s sphere of influence is limited because it is a pernicious presence.

[Lord Boateng (Lab)]

Can I press the Minister a bit on that? Wagner is in Burkina Faso and it threatens Ghana. It threatens the whole of that region. Have we increased our military attaché presence in west Africa in order to counter it? Frankly, if we have not, then we are whistling in the wind in terms of any hope of addressing the threat that it represents.

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

I do not have an answer to the specific question about the number of defence attachés we have there, but I will make the inquiry and undertake to write to the noble Lord.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister referred to Wagner, and the interventions by the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, and myself. I specifically asked why we have failed to proscribe Wagner. When she comes to write on these issues and other questions that have been asked—she said she would reply to them all in writing if they have not been answered on the Floor of the House—will she particularly address that question?

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

Strictly, this is not a matter for the MoD, as the noble Lord will be aware; it is, essentially, a matter for the Cabinet Office. These matters are not discussed; that is for another forum of discussion. I had a look at some organisations that have been proscribed, and I was not entirely clear what the benefit was. Yes, you nail them as people to have nothing to do with, but, actually, the more effective undermining of their position is to try to get at their financial wallets with sanctions. But I cannot give any advance on the Government’s positions already articulated.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, I do not want to detain the House, but this is a profoundly important point. For nearly a year now, the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, has been asking this question from the Lib Dem Benches of any Minister who will listen. All I say, respectfully, to the Minister is that she speaks for the whole of the Government, not just the Ministry of Defence, of course.

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

Yes, and I cannot add to the position I articulated. I have no further position to share with the House.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevens, raised some interesting points about shipbuilding. I remind him that, for the first time in 30 years, two UK shipyards are building two types of frigate—that is something to fly the flag about. In the refreshed national shipbuilding strategy, we set out the shipbuilding pipeline.

The noble Lord made an important point about our people, and he is absolutely correct: they are our most vital asset. We support them, and we shall respond to the Haythornthwaite review and, imminently, to the independent pay review board’s recommendations. I undertake to make further inquiries about his comment on the “zig-zag” career process and see whether I can obtain further information for him.

I am conscious of time, but I realise that what noble Lords want is to talk about this, to hold the Government to account and to hear from them, so, with noble Lords’ indulgence, I will keep going until I reach the end of my notes. My noble friend Lord Howell made a number of important and perceptive points, but I slightly disagree with him in one area. He said that the IR and the Defence Command Paper were in silos, but I do not see that; in this hybrid world of global threat, I see a very fast-changing and fluid set of imperatives, and it is about how we try to harness these in some strategic sense and then bring some intelligent specifics about how we will deal with them.

I agreed with my noble friend’s point about the Commonwealth, for which there is an important role. That is always worth exploring, and I would not disagree with that at all. I dealt with the position on China, but I was struck by my noble friend’s phrase about putting “autocracies on the defensive”. I have a lot of sympathy with doing that, and I share his analysis of these concerns. But I hope that the imminent Defence Command Paper refresh will reassure my noble friend that this is an active matter under current consideration.

The noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine, raised Russia, China and the new world order, which are important points. That is why the integrated review refresh is shaped as it is and why the Defence Command Paper refresh will be shaped as I have indicated in general terms.

The noble Lord, Lord Collins of Highbury—informally, he is my noble friend—raised important issues about the Army and, in particular, our NATO obligations. We will have a combined Army strength, regular and reserve, of over 100,000. It is important to put that in the context of what we are now dealing with. If we have learned anything from Ukraine, we have learned that, although land conflict might look unchanged in some respects, it is absolutely transformed in other respects because of how warfare is now conducted, with the deployment of various aspects of information technology and artificial intelligence.

I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Collins, that the UK contributes to every NATO mission. We did so in Iraq, in Kosovo and in the Med with Operation Sea Guardian, and the UK is making a very ambitious offer of forces to NATO’s force model. Our approach to the NATO force model has been “NATO by default and national by exception”, which means that almost all our forces across all domains will be made available to support NATO tasking and the deterrence and defence of the Euro-Atlantic. For 2024-25, we will transition from the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force to the inaugural allied land reaction force. We already contribute heavily to NATO deterrence activity.

The noble Lord, Lord Collins, also raised climate change, which is very dear to my heart. It might interest your Lordships—it may sound improbable, but it is absolutely the case—that within the MoD we have a director for climate change and sustainability. There is a Minister responsible for pursuing our policy in that sphere—me. I take a keen interest in what is going on and have been utterly bowled over by the innovation within our single services in devising how they adapt to climate change and, with their own ingenuity, make their contribution to reducing our emissions. We have had some extraordinary innovatory activity by the RAF, which leads the field in sustainable aviation fuel. It is incredible. I have been speaking to some think tanks in the RAF—geniuses at work in basements—and even if only one of their plans comes to fruition, it will be a major contribution.

I commend to your Lordships a wonderful magazine called Sanctuary. It is an MoD product, produced once a year; it looks great and it reads like a treat. I am sure the House of Lords Library will give your Lordships a copy to look at and I guarantee that it will cheer you up.

I apologise for running over time, but I detect that noble Lords genuinely want to hear about this. Work to resolve the issues that have been identified is either happening or currently under way. A number of noble Lords mentioned defence spending. The Defence Equipment Plan is public and lays out an exciting combination of spend and equipment, whether that is UK shipyards, Lossiemouth as a showcase for RAF potent power or an Army equipment plan of £41 billion over the next 10 years. I go back to something that the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Houghton of Richmond, said in the Chamber just last week. He very astutely pointed out that we need to get away from becoming fixating on a single force or a particular part of a capability. The trick now is to know how we amalgamate this holistically, to deliver the capability effect that we need to address threat.

Noble Lords are aware of the financial settlements that have been available in the last few years for defence. The Prime Minister has pledged, when economic circumstances improve, to raise our defence spending to 2.5% of GDP. I reassure the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, that this is a welcome boost in very difficult economic circumstances. Times are challenging but I think noble Lords can expect to see us accelerating our modernisation and mobilisation plans, investing in critical partnerships such as AUKUS and GCAP, the global combat air programme, restocking our munitions and upgrading our digital infrastructure.

The Command Paper is currently at write-round for clearance with other National Security Council members and will be published in the coming weeks. I think its recognition and release will bring with it a new reality. When Putin’s troops crossed the Dnieper at the start of 2022, they also crossed the Rubicon, because we now live in a completely transformed world. We cannot go back. We have to adapt rapidly and enhance our readiness. We must strengthen our resilience and reinforce our relationships to secure the peace and prosperity that our country and our allies deserve.

I say to those who might have been tempted to adopt a slightly depressive note that I regard it as a privilege to be a Minister in defence. I see at first hand uniformed and civilian staff of stellar calibre delivering every day on our UK strategic objectives, focused and with an effectiveness and professionalism that is second to none. It is a department that is dynamic in character, pulsating with energy and proud, with state-of-the-art equipment and underpinned by funding, to do the vital job we ask of it.

I particularly thank the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, for specifically seeking that out, commenting on it and paying their tribute to our Armed Forces, because I am very proud of all the people who contribute to our defence capability. I pay tribute to them and, on behalf of us all, I say to them: thank you.