AUKUS

Debate between Baroness Goldie and Lord Ricketts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ricketts (CB)]

My Lords, I welcome the Minister’s Statement. This is clearly a major strategic development and it will take time to digest all the implications of it. In the first place, it builds on a 50-year defence partnership with Australia on nuclear-powered submarines, with the United States. That is welcome. However, there are implications for our other allies, most particularly the French. The Minister is right to point to UK-French defence co-operation through Lancaster House but this agreement has been a major blow to France and it is important that we now find ways in which to work with the French as a major Indo-Pacific power themselves, and to find other ways in which to show that this partnership is not an exclusive relationship between the US, the UK and Australia. NATO allies such as Canada are also important players. Are there plans for specific proposals to put to the French to show that the western interest in Indo-Pacific security goes beyond this important new security partnership?

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

The noble Lord poses a pertinent question. I think I addressed his concerns partially in my response to the noble Baronesses, Lady Smith of Basildon and Lady Smith of Newnham.

Our relationship with France on defence is not some sort of sterile picking up of the phone now and again. We are committed to building on the achievements of the first 10 years of the Lancaster House accords in the decade to come. We will continue to consult each other daily and at all levels on key international defence and security matters. It is important to observe that, although we may no longer be in the EU, we cannot fractionalise security depending on where physical boundaries fall. The strength of security in the EU, and the strength of France’s ability to contribute to that security, matters to us in the UK, and vice versa. That is mutually understood and respected, so I assure the noble Lord that, yes, we anticipate continuing a very constructive relationship with France on defence matters.

Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy: Integrated Review

Debate between Baroness Goldie and Lord Ricketts

Wednesday 4th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie]

My Lords, let me try to tease out a few questions from the rhetoric. First, we have to be realistic: circumstances for the United Kingdom have changed dramatically, not least because we have left the EU, but particularly since the last strategic defence and security review in 2015. What we are contending with globally is unrecognisable from what we knew then. If this review was called the Johnson review, it would be a very appropriate title because it is an absolutely essential response to a geopolitical situation that is fluid globally. It is an essential response to the need to knit together government policy for defence, for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and, of course, for DfID. That is a very far-reaching prospect.

I do not share the noble Lord’s pessimism about the timescale for this review. He will be aware that, in fact, as far as defence is concerned, a lot of the preparatory work has been done: it is there and ready to be pulled down and presented by way of evidence to the review.

On the matter of spads, it is a little unfair to refer to people who are unable to be here to defend themselves. My experience of spads is limited but essentially positive—they can be an enormous help in the discharge of ministerial responsibility. It is very easy to get cheap headlines by knocking somebody because of the way they dress—no doubt, I could be knocked because of the way I dress—but I think what matters is the cerebral capacity that can be brought to the role, and I am absolutely satisfied about that.

[Lord Ricketts (CB)]

My Lords, may I declare an experience, as the co-ordinator of the 2010 strategic defence and security review? Does the Minister agree that good strategy is about choosing and prioritising? Does she accept that one of the most crucial aspects of this review is that it should start with a clear statement of the Government’s vision for Britain’s role in the world—a realistic role that gets beyond the slogan of “global Britain”?

[Baroness Goldie]

I am grateful to the noble Lord; he gets to the nub of the issue. The review will indeed develop global Britain’s foreign policy. It will focus on our alliances and diplomacy, look at the trends and shifts in power and wealth to which I referred, and then determine how best we can use our international development resource.