The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Dame Angela Eagle)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) on securing the debate. He will, of course, know the importance to this Government of the topics discussed today. Keeping the country safe is the first responsibility of any Government, and as the world changes, the way we uphold that responsibility must change with it. This adaptability is set out in the national security strategy, published last year at the beginning of the NATO summit in The Hague. Alongside it was the commitment to spend 5% of GDP on national security by 2035—3.5% for core defence spending and 1.5% for broader resilience and security spending.
The Majority of the UK’s hard national security capabilities, such as the recently announced 150,000 drones that the Ministry of Defence will supply to Ukraine by the end of the year, are funded and delivered by line departments. The Cabinet Office’s role is ensuring the effective running of government, and co-ordinating cross-cutting policies and operations. More than 90% of the national security and resilience budget for the Cabinet Office is therefore spent on the day-to-day running costs of the National Security Secretariat. That is a vital body that works with Departments to implement the national security strategy. It develops, leads and delivers policy across Government, and aligns, convenes and brokers the collective efforts of our stakeholders and partners on all aspects of national security. It is the nerve centre of our collective cross-Government security response. However, that spending it is not by any means the vast amount that is spent on national security and resilience across Government.
The Cabinet Office does invest in some assets. For example, the National Situation Centre, which is highly regarded internationally, provides situational awareness for crisis response by bringing together data analysis and expertise. The emergency alerts system is one of many public warning and informing capabilities that the UK Government, devolved Governments and category 1 responders have at their disposal. Since its launch, it has become an integral part of keeping the public safe, allowing the quick sharing of lifesaving information, and it is regularly tested to ensure its resilience. The UK Resilience Academy forms an important part of the skills and engagement offer. It was established in April last year to build the skills that are needed across the whole of society to respond to emergencies.
The national security strategy consolidates various reviews and strategies related to national security into a single, coherent framework. It outlines the strategic context, identifies the main challenges we face as a nation in an era of radical uncertainty, and establishes the framework that the UK uses to guide its actions both at home and abroad. It is both a clear-eyed and a hard-edged plan to deal with the breadth of the challenges that we face, setting out a long-term vision for how we will do three crucial things: protect security at home, promote strength abroad, and increase our sovereign and asymmetric capabilities.
The Government have developed an internal implementation approach to ensure the accountability and delivery of the national security strategy, as well as ensuring that we adapt to a volatile geopolitical landscape. That is why our national security is not the remit of one Department or Minister. We have identified specific objectives, and have assigned lead and assisting Departments to deliver them. Departments are responsible for periodic reporting on progress, and taking action to address any deficiencies.
The Government will continue to update the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy on progress, through formal public sessions and confidential sessions where appropriate. As part of the implementation of the strategy, we continue to make ourselves a harder target for hostile actors who seek to exploit our open, democratic society. That includes bolstering our cyber and economic security defences, which are essential to the fostering of innovation and growth.
Additionally, we are strengthening the defence of our borders and territorial waters.
In April the former Defence Secretary, the right hon. Member for Rawmarsh and Conisbrough (John Healey), exposed covert Russian undersea activity, paying tribute to the readiness of the UK’s armed forces to respond. In May, Baroness Lloyd, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, outlined DSIT’s plans to present new legislative proposals to modernise and strengthen penalties for malicious activity impacting our undersea infrastructure.
As I am sure events in recent weeks have made clear, our overriding priority is ensuring stability and security in the Euro-Atlantic area, starting with our unwavering support for Ukraine. In total, the UK has committed up to £25 billion for Ukraine: £16 billion in military support, £5.6 billion in non-military support, and £3.5 billion in UK export finance. We continue to go further, renewing and deepening our key alliances, particularly those with the United States and the European Union. All this work is bolstered by new international partnerships, especially in emerging policy areas such as technology—for example, the UK-India technology security initiative and the UK-Japan frontier technology partnership.
It remains the Government’s intention to publish the defence investment plan before the NATO summit, which will take place on 7 July. The plan will set out much of our future strategy when it comes to how we will protect and defend our country. Let me give Members some idea of its focus. We will rebuild our core defence industrial base, focusing on achieving greater resilience in our stockpiles and supporting warfighting readiness.
Sir Julian Lewis
I am going to ask the rather obvious question. Given that the plan is to be put forward under the existing Prime Minister, does that mean that if the new Prime Minister wishes to change it, it will be changed, or will the commitment that is to be made to the forthcoming NATO Assembly have to stand as it is?
Dame Angela Eagle
As always, the right hon. Gentleman has asked a very important question. I think the key thing to understand is that this work is ongoing, and that there will be co-operation between the current Prime Minister and—I do not want to get ahead of what Labour party members might decide to do—whoever the next Prime Minister will be. I hope that gives the right hon. Gentleman some assurance.
Beyond defence, we will identify, protect and cultivate other sovereign capabilities, such as foundational industries and frontier technologies, that are critical to our industrial base and national competitiveness. I was interested by what my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington said in this connection. We are in close contact and collaboration with states such as Canada to learn as much as we can about how they do resilience, although I might gently suggest that the Canadian landmass is slightly different from the UK landmass when it comes to thinking of organising a defence for it, and slightly different approaches will clearly have to be taken, given the geographical realities. However, there is much on which we can co-operate.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Order. The hon. Member has been here throughout the debate.
Mr Snowden
Thank you very much for coming to my assistance, Madam Deputy Speaker—or to my defence, rather ironically.
The Minister has touched on critical industries as a key part of our defence plans for the future. Does she agree that our sovereign capability to manufacture our own fighter aircraft is critical, and does she share my dismay that our production lines sit empty, with no orders from the Government to maintain that sovereign capability?
Dame Angela Eagle
All I will say is that it is important that we rebuild our industrial infrastructure and make sure that we not only maintain but strengthen our sovereign capabilities, not only for now but with forward-looking tech and investment. The Government are determined to do that.
A foundation of our national security is our ability to assess, mitigate, respond to and recover from the risks that we face, should they manifest. These risks could come from anywhere. They could be natural hazards, as we have all been experiencing over the last few days, or they could be deliberate attacks, disease outbreaks or other civil emergencies.
Dame Angela Eagle
I agree, and it is important for the hon. Lady to understand that we are integrating climate change risks into our work. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is the leading Department on work on climate adaptation, not mitigation. It is important that lead Departments can focus on the issue at hand, and DEFRA is doing adaptation.
Dr Chowns
One of the key points that I tried to get across in my speech is that this has to be a whole-of-Government effort. DEFRA cannot put in place a strategy to adapt the health service to the reality of climate change. It cannot put in place a strategy to adapt our schools, our transport infrastructure or our energy infrastructure to the reality of climate change. Does the Minister not recognise that this has to be a whole-of-Government effort, and that it is not something that DEFRA can hold? That is precisely why we need a Cabinet Office Minister to lead on climate resilience.
Dame Angela Eagle
The hon. Lady points out that adaptation is a cross-Government, cross-departmental thing. The way that the UK Government are organised means that Departments that are responsible for school buildings or transport deal with the adaptation issues that crop up in those Departments. I do not disagree with the hon. Lady’s analysis, but while the Cabinet Office does have a co-ordinating role, I do not necessarily think that having a Minister co-ordinating it would make an awful lot of difference.
Alicia Kearns
Since as early as 2013, when I was working with the Cabinet Office—specifically with the Joint Intelligence Organisation and others—climate change has been included in the matrix that it is required to plan for, respond to and seek to mitigate from a national security perspective. It is very much reflected in the national —I have forgotten the exact words, but it is the one that does not have an acronym. That is what happens when you work on something for too long. Climate change is in there and has been in there for a very long time, even way back when I was a civil servant.
Dame Angela Eagle
The hon. Lady is correct, and she talks about mitigation. There is also an adaptation issue here, which I was addressing, but clearly the cross-departmental nature of co-ordination happens within the Cabinet Office.
Our country’s resilience is front and centre of our approach to national security. Without security and resilience at home, we cannot deliver economic growth or any of our other missions to improve the lives of the British people.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Phil Brickell) gave a good speech about what happens if corruption is allowed to get out of hand and people who defraud the public purse of money are allowed to get away with it. I thank him for asking important questions about Tom Hayhoe’s recommendations. I promise to make inquiries with colleagues in Government, and commit to writing to him about the specific issues that he raised in his speech.
The Government inherited a resilience landscape that had too often been neglected, leaving our nation exposed to the shocks of an increasingly volatile world. The resilience action plan, published last July, sets out the Government’s strategic approach to creating a stronger and more resilient UK, and the steps being taken to deliver it. We face a rapidly changing global risk landscape. From severe weather to geopolitical instability, the risks are complex and numerous. We must be honest with the public about the challenges while demonstrating our resolve to address them head-on, and we have to strike a balance by giving an appropriate warning without panicking people. Building a truly resilient society requires a fundamental cultural shift in the way that emergency preparedness is thought about. That includes being clear about the risks we face and the actions that we can all take to improve collective resilience, as the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) said from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench.
In summary, our No. 1 priority is to keep the country safe. The Government are undertaking plenty of work within our own shores to strengthen our stance, which is further bolstered by our unshakeable commitment to Europe-wide security. That responsibility has been spread right across the Government, and it is emblematic of the good work that can come when collaboration is at the heart of planning. Thanks to this work, the risk landscape is not an unknown country; we have made it familiar terrain through rigorous mapping of what could harm us and our citizens, and of what our response should be. It is through level-headed planning that we will create resilience at home and, through that work, create a secure foundation for families, businesses and economies to thrive.