Oral Answers to Questions

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

I shall have to write to the hon. Lady about the Red Arrows, because I was not expecting that question, but the Tempest project is an important signal to BAE Systems that the Government are committed to another generation of fast jets. I shall be meeting representatives of BAE soon, and I shall ensure that its desire to be part of the programme is reflected in the locations of its workforce around the country.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State made a very significant statement from the Dispatch Box a while ago when he said that companies should invest where the skills are and where the customers are. That only applies if the customers are prepared to use their buying power to insist that the manufacturing takes place in the UK. Why will the Secretary of State not change Government policy, even before Brexit, and insist that the solid support vessels are built in British yards? Make a decision, man!

[Mr Wallace]

The two aircraft carriers are built in British yards, the Type 26 is built in British yards, the Type 45 is built in British yards, the offshore patrol Batch 2 is built in British yards, the Type 31 is currently built in British yards, and we will continue to invest in our yards. The right hon. Gentleman will have heard the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth) ask how we could ensure that BAE continued to invest in its workforce. It can continue to invest in its workforce because it also manages to export around the world When we export, we must recognise that we need an international consortium, because we cannot sell purely to ourselves; we have to export around the world.

Defence Spending

John Spellar Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2019 Westminster Hall

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

The hon. Gentleman pre-empts some of what I am going to talk about. He is absolutely right.

Our doctors and nurses tell us directly and bluntly if the funding systems for the NHS are not working properly so we can do something about it and advocate for them. However, that is not an option for our defence chiefs, so it is hard for us to know whether their resources would be sustainable and resilient if there were a major crisis. The question is not only whether enough funding is going into our defences but whether we are spending it correctly—a narrative that ran successfully after the strategic defence and security review in 2010, when the country was in dire financial straits and the former Member for Whitney had the unenviable challenge of trying to put it back on to a stable financial footing. SDSR ’10 declared—conveniently, perhaps, to match the financial crisis—that the Ministry of Defence, like other Departments, had to find efficiencies. There is no question but that that was the right thing to do.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

First, I resent the use of the word “efficiencies”. Basically, that is Treasury speak for cuts, and it would not face up to that. Secondly, the hon. Lady is clearly under a misapprehension: the country was on a very steady path to reducing the deficit. Owing to the crash-and-burn tactics of Mr George Osborne, we went into a recession, which lessened the revenue coming in, deepened the crisis and worsened the deficit.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

As ever, the right hon. Gentleman is a great defender of his party’s financial position. I would not choose to pick a fight with him, because he is a staunch defender of all matters defence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

The hon. Gentleman’s point is well made. I will refer to submarines later. We need to challenge the Department continually on whether Committees such as the Defence Committee and the Public Accounts Committee, on which I sit, have the tools to look pre-emptively at the risks of those sorts of decisions.

There is also a mantra that technology is changing how we do everything and that it will, as if by magic, solve all challenges. It is implied that it will make everything cheaper, and that we can stop doing things the old way because there will be a whizzy, less manpower-hungry solution. Although it is true that world-leading UK defence businesses are creating extraordinary cutting-edge kit, that is not the only tool for solving our defence challenges. From Florence Nightingale and her medical advances to Alan Turing, the urgent need to gain advantage over the enemy has always brought out the brilliance of our citizens’ inventive genes. Defence has always been at the forefront of innovation because defence in action stretches human ingenuity under the insane pressures of war.

[John Spellar]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on her excellent speech. However, for industry to be able to respond, there needs to be an industry. That requires the British armed forces and the Treasury to put orders into British factories and British yards, rather than applying a model of international competition that takes no account of the prosperity agenda and no account of the long-term sustainability of the defence industry and its ability to innovate.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

That question of sovereignty and the prosperity agenda—the third pillar of defence’s remit—is one we need to continue to challenge. As a Brexiteer, I am happy to say that I think we will have more authority to speak in how we choose to do that—

[John Spellar]

That’s not true.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

Well, that is my opinion. Leaving the EU will give us more flexibility to bring the various parties together and will enable UK businesses, which are world leading, to make their case as effectively as possible.

[John Spellar]

The hon. Lady should not allow herself to be misled by Treasury-speak. In both European regulations and the Treasury Green Book, the Ministry of Defence has all the tools it needs to support British industry. The problem is a lack of will. It does not help to blame the EU. The problems are in Whitehall, not in Brussels.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman. The Minister will have heard his perspective.

One of the key issues for defence is its people, who are flexible, selfless, uncomplaining and serve willingly—indeed, alongside the Minister, who puts his life on the line to serve his country. Equipment changes constantly—if it did not, we would still be sending our Navy to sea under sail—but the quality of our people is always critical. We spend more than a third of our defence budget on people. I say that that is an investment, since they are highly trained and we invest in their training throughout their careers, in a way almost no other employer does. However, we classify them as a cost, so departmental behaviour fails to look after them—our human capital—as assets.

We would not fail to repaint a warship—clearly, that would make her less seaworthy or less capable of dealing with the scars of battle—yet we are perfectly content to fail to invest in the personnel who serve, by not looking after their families and by failing to demonstrate what the armed forces covenant should mean: that if someone has served or is serving, this country genuinely thinks they and their family should not suffer disadvantage. It is imperative that we change the financial models the MOD is allowed to use so that our human capital can be classified as an asset. Service chiefs cannot determine how to reward their personnel, because they are not allowed to use their budgets freely to maximise the benefit to their people and their service. For small change—in both senses of the word—the behavioural changes achieved by flexibility would be substantial and immediate.

I believe the reason change is not happening is that the Department and the Treasury fail to understand the nature of military preparedness, and do not seem to question our resilience if we need to put our military under pressure. Although we put kit that is small, plentiful, cheap and speedy to resource on to the soldier, we put highly skilled men and women, who take years to train, into equipment in the Royal Navy and the RAF that takes years to build. A modern warship or fast jet cannot be whipped up in a few months. It is at the mercy of international supply chains, the risks of which, as the right hon. Member for Warley (John Spellar) mentioned, perhaps are not properly understood.

Importantly, that equipment would take a long time to replace if lost. Although bullets for small arms can be produced at speed if necessary, the missiles sustaining our warships and Air Force cannot be churned through a production line at speed if they are suddenly required. Training a submarine commanding officer or fast jet pilot takes years of investment—it takes time. Too often, it feels like the Department’s financial models simply refuse to acknowledge that and fail to understand the human capital investment that is being made, leaving us with huge risk from poorly assessed decisions.

We must consider the key tenets of successful defence and assess whether we are investing enough to sustain them. The first is deterrence. Deterrence works. Nuclear is the ultimate deterrent, but we must never forget that conventional deterrence has greater utility and that strong power generates respect. Let us consider for a moment our nuclear deterrent in its 50th year in our Royal Navy. Our continuous at-sea deterrent is an extraordinary feat. I always refer to it as our best weapon of peace, because the threat of nuclear war has ensured that we have had no more global wars. Humanity understands genuine existential threat, and the CASD is the embodiment of the UK and USA’s global policing, which reminds any rogue state why using a nuclear weapon would be a bad decision. But do we invest properly in our submarine service?

Oral Answers to Questions

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 8th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

rose—

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Ah! Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Or, as one might say, R2-D2 and C-3PO.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

Come, come, young Spellar—your turn now.

[John Spellar]

I hope that the Minister will also acknowledge the great role of the Defence Committee, under the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) as Chairman, and the trade unions in maintaining the facility at GE Rugby and seeing off GE’s attempts to close it. May I bring the Minister back to the solid support ship contract and ask him to answer the question asked by my right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones)? What weighting is given to prosperity? Will he please stop blaming the European Union, when every other country in the European Union looks after its own industry and supports its own yards and its own steel industry? Why will he not show some gumption and do the same?

[Stuart Andrew]

I thought I had shown some gumption. As I have said, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said that the policy will be changing—

[John Spellar]

Why don’t you change it now?

[Stuart Andrew]

I have just explained that the timelines are critical in the current competition, because the existing fleet that will offer support to the carrier will be coming to the end of its life. We have to have that capability. Surely he thinks that is more important than just trying to score a political point.

Combat Air Strategy

John Spellar Excerpts

Thursday 27th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Combat Air Strategy progress and next steps.

It is an honour and a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

As we consider what aircraft will replace the Typhoon, it is appropriate for us to remember those who operate that aircraft now. I am particularly mindful that only a couple of days ago we heard the tragic news about the loss of two German Eurofighters and a pilot in a crash. The German air force remains a key ally, as it was during the cold war, and it is one of the best equipped in the world. Germany is one of our closest friends, as well as being a key NATO ally. I am sure that we are all mindful of the loss of that German pilot. We cannot know the reason for the crash at this stage, and we ought not to speculate, but it may be that we touch on issues such as training or serviceability as part of the debate. Whatever the reasons, it is a sad moment for all friends of Germany and of aviators. I would like us to remember them all at this time.

It is good to see so many Members here as we consider the combat air strategy, particularly given that so many were also present in November 2017 when the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth) and I sponsored the original debate calling for a combat air strategy—in fact, it was for a defence aerospace industrial strategy; I will refer to that terminology, which is not just semantics, in a moment or two. Progress has certainly been made: the combat air strategy was published in July 2018, while Team Tempest—including the Royal Air Force, the Ministry of Defence, BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, Leonardo UK and MBDA UK—and the mock-up of the Tempest aircraft were unveiled at the Royal International Air Tattoo last year.

However, there is much more to do. It is appropriate for us all to take stock at this stage, not least because other competitors in the field are forging ahead. This is the right moment to have this debate, given that only last week at the Paris air show the Franco-German team unveiled what has been referred to as their “squashed Raptor” design; anyone who does not know what I mean should take a picture of the F-22 Raptor and then look the Franco-German model, then they will see it exactly. The Turkish fighter concept was unveiled at the same time. In some ways, they are a year or so behind Team Tempest’s efforts, but in some ways they are more developed. They seem to have dates for first flight outlined, which I think I am correct in saying we do not yet have. In any event, there is clearly no room for complacency.

I make one perhaps basic point, although it is not the most important: perhaps we could just call the aircraft that we are discussing “Tempest”. The name has historic resonance—the Hawker Tempest replaced the Hawker Typhoon, as this Tempest should replace our Typhoon. It also provides a logical progression, from Tornado to Typhoon to Tempest. I appreciate that this is not the most important point that we will discuss, but it might make it easier for everyone if we do not have to wrestle with baffling military acronyms or phrases such as “combat air” or “FCAS”—future combat air system. I would rather that we did not have a minor international incident, as with Typhoon, by debating at the end of the programme what the aircraft will be called. In any event, I suggest that we call this aircraft Tempest, and I will refer to it as Tempest today.

Before we get into the details, we should look at why it is so important that we have a combat air strategy. Defence aerospace has accounted for about 87% of defence exports over the last 10 years, and the UK combat air sector has an approximate annual turnover of more than £6 billion. The F-35 programme directly employs around 2,200 people, with Hawk at 1,500 and Typhoon around 5,000. Hawk is estimated—through the 1,000 or so aircraft built or on order—to bring in £15.8 billion over its lifetime to the UK Government, for an outlay of around £900 million. Typhoon will have brought in £28.2 billion, against an outlay of £15.2 billion, showing a clear economic benefit, entirely leaving aside the geopolitical desirability of British sovereign capability. Those figures are before we consider the recent Qatar deal or any future sales over which discussions are ongoing.

However, the issue is not all about money: it is also about finding a way to develop, sponsor and bring on the technology that then has a spin-off in other areas of everyday life, as it has throughout history; the combat air strategy rightly points out that the software used in the Tornado, the Typhoon and the C-130J now provides the rail timetabling system for the London Underground. However, the battle that we often seem to fight in the House is over funding for these projects, in the face of the short-sighted argument that military equipment is simply a financial drain. Of course it costs money, but it brings in money, as well as maintaining vital national independence.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for introducing the debate so well. He particularly highlights the contribution of the hardware side. Is it not also important that we maintain the military side, because of the impact right the way through the supply chain on many specialist subcontractors—often at tiers 3 and 4 —that are also a vital part of civil aerospace, Formula 1 and the motor industry? Those are all areas in which we are internationally competitive and which help us to pay our way in the world.

[Robert Courts]

I agree entirely. We often do not realise the impact of the defence industry on each of our constituencies. Many of us will have in our constituencies sometimes quite small companies that make something as part of the supply chain for a much bigger machine. That is absolutely right, and we must work hard to protect that. As the right hon. Gentleman rightly identifies, it goes to the wider impact of technology on the rest of our lives.

I would like each and every one of us, as individual MPs, to consider making arguments to the Treasury about how defence is accounted for. We have to start fighting the battle to turn the tide against the perception that defence and the defence industry simply cost money. I am very encouraged by the Secretary of State for Defence’s comments in the current edition of The House magazine; I hope you will not mind if I quote her, Mr Stringer. She says:

“I think that the Treasury has been missing a trick. It has not really understood the full value of defence to the nation. The methodology that it uses is flawed. So, in advance of the spending review I will be setting out why I think it should change its methodology towards its assessment of the return to the UK of investing in defence. I think there’s much more we can do to reap the benefits that defence brings to the UK prosperity agenda.”

I entirely agree. However, I do not think it is a matter for only the Defence Secretary to deal with. It is a matter for each of us—whether we have military or the defence industry in our constituencies, or both—to keep making the case for what the defence industry and our armed forces bring to UK plc.

[John Spellar]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. What he describes requires a really significant change in mindset in the civil service, and particularly in the Treasury, regarding procurement guidelines: they relentlessly refuse to take into account the impact on the prosperity agenda, which they talk about, or even how much they will get in as revenue from the taxes of people working in this country, rather than working in other countries. That goes across the board. Is not it time for a fundamental rethink, in line with how every one of our major international industrial competitors operates?

[Robert Courts]

Again, I am grateful. The right hon. Gentleman has made the point succinctly. I agree entirely, as I suspect all of us will today—and I think that the Secretary of State is on the same page as we are. Yes, it is time; that is exactly what I am asking for.

[John Spellar]

Has the memo got to the Minister for procurement?

[Robert Courts]

We are very much asking for a fundamental rethink of the way the Treasury accounts for the contribution of defence. It is probably time for me to make the old joke that we often make when having these debates. I am mindful of the words of my grandfather, who was in Bomber Command during the war. He used to say that the opposition, the opposing armed forces, were not the enemy; they were just people who were playing the same game but at the other end of the pitch. The opposition are just the opposition; the real enemy is the Treasury.

As I said, we often make that old joke in these debates, but it is true. We all find ourselves constantly having to ask the Treasury for more money, but also begging the Treasury, as we have done on both sides of the House, to see the value that defence brings to the economy—it is not just the cost—when programmes have to be invested in. It was a slightly flippant point, but this is the ongoing battle that we have to fight every time any of us stands up to speak about the defence industry or investing in the equipment that our armed forces will need for the future.

That understanding is vital. Although I am addressing my remarks to the Minister responsible for defence procurement, the ramifications of what I am saying go far beyond this Minister and his Secretary of State. They extend also to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, because we need people to have the skills required to build the systems that we are talking about. We need to look also to the Department for International Trade and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, because of the diplomacy required to assemble the multinational team who are likely to be required to build the aircraft. Of course, the Treasury will always sit in the middle, because it is the one that holds the money, but this work will require top-level political direction to ensure that it takes place. We will want to see the next Prime Minister direct and ensure the cross-Government co-ordination required for this project to be a success.

We ought to look at the form of the project. The Franco-German team who announced their project last week have made it clear that it will involve the next- generation fighter, as it is called, but also remote carriers—they are sometimes called loyal wingmen; essentially they are unmanned aerial vehicles that feed off and support the main manned aircraft—and that that will encompass an air combat cloud, the manned aircraft accompanied by UAVs as a swarm concept. Although we are likely to look to do the same, the form of the project is not yet entirely clear, but it does have significant ramifications in terms of work share, intellectual property protection and, consequently, who the national partners are or can be.

I would like to talk first about national partners. We will all welcome the British drive and British lead, but it probably is not a wild stab in the dark to suggest that we will probably not design and produce a sixth-generation aircraft all on our own, only to equip the Royal Air Force, because sales and production of aircraft are inextricably linked to work share and to the ultimate sales partner. We are aware that conversations are taking place. The Swedish, the Italians and the Japanese are perhaps the obvious partners with whom we are considering working, but there is a real need for urgency.

In November 2018, the Spanish announced that they were considering options for replacement of their F/A-18 Hornet fleet and they were in discussions with the Dassault and Airbus team, who are a Franco-German operation, as well as Team Tempest. They stated that the key factor was the level of industrial participation that was offered. Of course, last week, they signed up with the Franco-German operation at the Paris air show. I have no way of knowing—the Minister may—whether that was as a result of a deliberate British decision. It may be that the level of expertise or financial input offered was unattractive to us, or it may be that it was a result of a Spanish decision to go elsewhere, but at the very least we can say that it is clear that there is competition between the rival British and Franco-German blocs, either to become the more established and advanced programme and to persuade the other to join in, but on their terms, or to ensure the success of their programme because national participation naturally brings orders.

The Franco-German operation is naturally looking at the same potential partners as we are, so it is essential that we have top-level political engagement, repeating Mrs Thatcher’s work in the early stages of the Eurofighter programme in the 1980s. I will turn to the issue of political engagement for a moment now. The Minister will have to forgive me. I know how deeply engaged he is, but this is something that goes beyond his hard work and his Secretary of State as well. It goes up all the way up to full Cabinet support and the support of the Prime Minister.

We can see the approach taken by France. President Macron launched the Franco-German project on 17 June, introducing the partnership of those countries with Spain and signing an agreement at the Paris airshow. There is no doubt that for the French and Germans, that is a national and European project in which they invest considerable prestige, and they will be determined to succeed and to claim for themselves, potentially, aerospace territory that has traditionally been the purview of the British, and they are deploying top-level politicians to achieve that.

The downside of the Franco-German approach is that they will want to be the architects of the project, shaping the capability and design of the aircraft. They may allow others to make the metaphorical bricks, but they will not allow them to sculpt the resulting edifice. We therefore have a golden opportunity to involve those who have outstanding aerospace sectors that either are under-appreciated—such as, perhaps, the Italians—or have not achieved the cut-through that they deserve, which may be the case with Sweden. However, as I have said, that will require political engagement at the very highest level to bring them together.

Just as the Franco-German project is a symbol of those countries’ increasing integration in political as well as military terms, so it is vital that the Tempest project is, for us, a symbol of an outward-looking, co-operative, internationally minded UK post Brexit, a practical illustration of the frequently uttered words that although we are leaving the European Union, we are not leaving Europe, and proof that European co-operation and a European identity exist and thrive outside the political union of the EU.

The current terms of the combat air strategy suggest that it would not be possible for Britain to join the Franco-German project, for reasons such as retaining UK IP—I will return to that point in a minute—but the very last thing that the country or industry needs is lukewarm political commitment leading to a British folding into a rival project, with all that that would mean for our national industry. I am wary of warm words. We are heading in the right direction, and the document that we have seen is very valuable, but history has shown that what I am warning about has happened all too often in the past. There is no avoiding the fact that top-level political commitment is needed not only now, but in the months and years ahead.

We have the biggest air show in the world at the Royal International Air Tattoo in July, as well as the Defence and Security Equipment International exhibition, which international leaders will be visiting, but I would like to see our national leaders going abroad to visit other countries to seek and gain their support. When that is got right—as it has been with Australia for frigates and Wedgetail—we can see the benefits, in terms of not just capability but international influence, as we are a country that does not just work within the Five Eyes intelligence network but provides top-class capability. We stand to gain skills and prosperity as well as international influence if we can manufacture and support aircraft. Hawk shows us how successfully that can be done.

The ambition to secure international influence is shown on page 25 of the combat air strategy, as part of the colourfully illustrated national value framework. I am glad to have that in front of me, and I know the Minister does as well. I am pleased to see it, but currently these are just words; they need to be supported by the top-level political leadership of which I have spoken. I would like to dwell for a moment on the wording of paragraph 38 at the top of page 25, which reads:

“The framework allows the Ministry of Defence to compare the relative benefits of a range of options from procuring ‘off-the-shelf’ to partnering with allies. When placed alongside detailed cost analysis it will enable us to determine relative value for money of the options and consider trade-offs.”

That seems to me to be very broadly drafted and to encompass about five possible options. The Minister might tell me that there are others.

First, that could encompass life extensions to Typhoon. Although that would be welcome for the purpose of bringing on new technology, it is not something that we should be looking at long term. Secondly, it could mean no aircraft—a re-heated Sandys report. I think that was wrong then and remains wrong now. Thirdly, that wording could simply mean buying off the shelf. In fact, the phrase “off-the-shelf” is used. There has always been a good argument, on the face of it, that we can buy good kit cheaply from the Americans. That is true, so far as it goes, but it would leave us without a domestic industry or the ability to make our own combat aircraft, and would remove the international influence that I have spoken of, which is the main advantage of a combat air strategy. I suggest that that option ought to be no more than a last resort.

Fourthly, partnering with allies might mean being a junior partner, as is the case with F-35. That is fine. We might have the advantage of large workshare, but be unable to shape the aircraft for our needs, obtain international influence or protect our leading high-tech capability, which we all want to protect. Fifthly, there is the option of being a leading partner, which is what Team Tempest seems to be aiming for. I would favour that option.

The wording leaves a lot of room for manoeuvre. Perhaps—heaven forbid!—it was deliberately drafted like that. I am pushing for the fifth option, where the UK is a lead partner. Other hon. Members and I are pushing for political leadership to that end. We do not want a strategy that sounds good in practice but ends up leaving sufficient space for a far less ambitious position, which does not provide the Royal Air Force with the capability it needs or protect the sovereign industry, about which hon. Members in all parts of the Chamber have spoken so powerfully. We have seen that in the past.

Any hon. Members who have been in debates with me before will remember my aviation history lessons—I will not give them another. [Interruption.] I am sorry to hear that that is regretted. Perhaps I will do so another time; I have spoken for long enough already. The whole point of the combat air strategy, which the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North and I pushed for way back in November 2017, was precisely to avoid that happening again. Can the Minister confirm that the Government are determined to pursue the lead partner option and whether any of the options that I have posited have been ruled out?

We will need to consider whether the offer of an airframe alone will be enough to make a success of this strategy, or whether it will need further expansion. I suggest that we ought to be looking at a system, rather than an airframe, so that we can include other capability and diplomacy. We can look at the Qatari Typhoon sale as an example. As part of that multibillion pound contract to supply Qatar with Typhoon and Hawk, No. 12 Squadron is integrating Qatari personnel, including pilots and ground crew at RAF Coningsby, before moving to Qatar.

That is a package of training and co-operation with UK counterparts that has not been seen since the second world war, when the RAF last formed a squadron with another nation. Perhaps we need to be a little careful and assess the success of that project, to ensure that it is working for the RAF as well as for industry. However, we have seen from that sale that the need for training—particularly the desire for training associated with the world-class quality mark of the Royal Air Force—may be a major part of any deal in the future, whether regarding aircraft alone or as a package. We ought to consider that sort of thing as part of the combat air strategy as well.

Saab has added GlobalEye airborne early warning and control aircraft to its offer of Gripens for the Finnish air force, which Typhoon is already also competing in. If we are to offer Tempest to other nations in due course, will it include, for example, an air combat cloud, and if so, who will we be able to share that IP technology with? Would we want to offer, for example, tanker or ISTAR—intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance—transport assets as part of the package? Would we want to offer training packages or training aircraft?

That last point is important, and it is why I return to the title of the debate. I am not simply focusing on semantics here. The debate held in November 2017 called for a defence aerospace industrial strategy. That encompasses more than just combat air, which is what this strategy principally deals with. This deals with the airframe that will become Tempest, but I suggest that an overall strategy ought to consider what will replace, among other things, Hawk. I ask the Minister to approach that issue again.

The point of having a defence aerospace industrial strategy is to understand what air power we will need as a nation in the future. That includes not just the frontline fast jet aircraft, but the training aircraft and the training regime that will be needed to accompany it.

I would like to talk about the industrial base and the skill base before I conclude—I am conscious that other hon. Members want to speak. I welcome the Eurofighter Typhoon development plan that was launched last week, with the NATO Eurofighter and Tornado Management Agency. We need to ensure that Typhoon has ongoing investment in the years ahead. It might seem counter- intuitive, but everyone here will realise that, to an extent, the airframe is simply a framework into which other things are put. That is not entirely true, because there is technology around low observability, engine nozzles, stores carriage, and optimisation for air-to-air or air-to-ground; but to some extent it is true.

Much of the technology we will see on Tempest will not really be brand new, but will have been debuted on Typhoon, so it is essential that the Typhoon and Future Combat Air System teams are in constant contact with each other, rather than being in separate silos, to ensure that the capability is rolled out as it becomes available, so that it is bedded in and matures on Typhoon, which therefore not only benefits from the upgrades, but leads us to a seamless transition from Typhoon to Tempest in about 20 years’ time—it is extraordinary to say that.

The political engagement that I have spoken of also needs to be deployed in order to continue to see Typhoon exports, and to produce and continue to protect the industrial skills base that will be needed for Tempest. That brings me to the importance of engagement with science, technology, engineering and maths in education. Students throughout the UK should realise that this is their aircraft. It is something that they can work on and perhaps even fly. We cannot wait until people are in their teens or 20s before trying to get them interested in defence aerospace.

I am grateful to Royal Air Force Brize Norton for engaging enthusiastically with Carterton Community College to design a STEM programme, which was so successful that it has been mentioned in the report from Chief of the Air Staff to Her Majesty the Queen. I appreciate that that is not possible everywhere, but where there is a local asset, whether in the defence industry or a military asset, let us try to link up local schools and enthuse young people about the possibilities of the exciting national project that Tempest will be.

That will also require a Government assessment of the skills that we will need and consideration of how we will keep them. We cannot consider what skills we will need until we have decided whether to build radar, airframes, pilot support, or mission control systems and so on. That must all start now, which is the reason for my gentle prodding today.

I have four asks of the Minister, beyond the more detailed Team Tempest updates that he will remember having promised when we discussed military manufacturing in May, in particular on the outline business case that the report said would be produced by the end of last year. I hope that the Minister will relay to the Department that top-level political support and re-engagement are needed to require international partners to come on board. We need improved cross-departmental working, with the Treasury seeing the benefits to British industry as a project of national value, rather than seeing the defence industry simply as a cash drain. We also need next-stage funding; the £2 million that Team Tempest has had is only seedcorn money, and more will be needed to move to the next stage. Finally, the wider requirements of the defence aerospace industrial strategy should be considered alongside the Tempest combat air strategy.

We are on the cusp of a very exciting national project. I look forward to the Minister’s comments and to driving this forward with colleagues in all parts of the House.

Defence Industry: Scotland

John Spellar Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2019 Westminster Hall

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for the speech that he is making, which is very helpful. The British space industry has not only been successful here, but has played a huge part in the European project Galileo. Does he share my regret that the European Commission, in a fit of pique, has decided to kick us out of the project, to which we have made not only a financial contribution, but an enormous industrial contribution? Europe should really be holding that up as an example of competing in the world.

[Ged Killen]

My right hon. Friend will not be surprised to know that we have different views on Britain’s membership of the European Union. I largely consider that we are kicking ourselves out of the EU and should accept the consequences of that, although I regret the impact that it will have on projects such as Galileo.

Further to the space sector, the construction of advanced land vehicles offers an excellent opportunity for the expansion of the defence industry in Scotland. Glasgow now hosts an armoured vehicle centre of excellence, which was set up by defence company Thales. The centre aims to provide the MOD with an excellent new resource for the development of armoured vehicles.

Thales is currently bidding for the MOD’s multi role vehicle-protected programme which, if successful, would see 50 highly skilled engineering design and manufacturing jobs brought to the Glasgow site, and the possibility of 30 additional jobs created over the programme’s lifetime. Thales has said that if it is selected for the MRV-P and as the UK design authority and integrator for the Boxer and its variants, 100 new jobs could be created directly, while 180 jobs could be created through supply chains and around 200 further jobs could be supported indirectly.

Such programmes are vital for expanding the diversity of the defence industry in Scotland and introducing new skills, as well as deepening the existing skills base. A great example is my constituent Stewart Macpherson, an employee at Thales Glasgow who has been chosen as one of the top 30 electronics engineers under 30 in the UK.

Encouraging and supporting new skills and professionals is a great benefit of defence investment, so I should be grateful for an update from the Minister on the progress towards reaching a decision on the MRV-P programme. I appreciate, however, that he may only be able to reveal certain information as some might be commercially sensitive.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ged Killen]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his point, which was well made. I am sure that the Minister will respond in his remarks.

[John Spellar]

Is it not the case that the solid support ships would be ideal for the Rosyth site to maintain its workforce until aircraft carrier refits are necessary? Does that not show that the Government have not learned the lesson of the gap in work at Barrow, which then required a reconstruction of the workforce at huge cost? Surely the Government are saving pennies now but costing pounds later.

[Ged Killen]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. To be frank, I find it amazing that the red, white and blue Conservative party of Great Britain does not see the merit of building such ships in Britain, creating so much benefit for years to come.

In the context of this debate, we must also look at the Scottish Government’s role. Recently, the First Minister set out her plans for a new independence referendum. We must therefore consider the impact of that policy on long-term investment. Scotland’s shipyards rely on the pipeline of complex warships to be constructed for the Ministry of Defence—at least one remaining aircraft carrier, five offshore patrol vehicles and eight frigates—but if Scotland were to become independent before the next Holyrood election, as the SNP plans, the MOD has indicated that Scotland could be excluded from producing UK warships under article 346, or a similar rule if the UK has left the EU. Without those contracts, the shipyards would need to find alternative sources of demand in order to remain open, and I hope that the SNP will elaborate on that in any contribution today.

The MOD spends about £1.6 billion a year directly on Scottish industry, with £900 million spent directly on shipbuilding. The Growth Commission report stated that the entire defence budget for an independent Scotland would be £3 billion, plus £450 million to be used over five years to set up the apparatus of an entire independent state, of which a defence force is just one part. From that combined pool, therefore, the SNP proposes to find at least £900 million a year just to keep the shipyards open, while also setting up a new defence force, equipping it, and ensuring that its IT and support systems work properly. That is before we get on to the implications of importing the necessary components required for advanced manufacturing under a new currency.

That is £450 million to set up a new state in five years, including a defence force, but in less than five years it has cost the Scottish Government £200 million to set up a Scottish social security system and £178 million to set up an IT system to allocate payments to farmers. When we consider the complexity required to set up a new modern military force with all the support and complex IT architecture necessary, we realise that the figures do not add up. Scotland is being let down by both its Governments.

Continuous At-Sea Deterrent

John Spellar Excerpts

Wednesday 10th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, and it is something that I would be willing to look at. I am sure he is aware that it is not, sadly, a decision purely for the Ministry of Defence, but we would certainly be happy to look at the merits of that and how we give full recognition to all the crews that have served over such a long period.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for giving way, for his welcome announcement and for his response to my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock). I am not cavilling, but will he try to ensure that these medals are made in the UK, please?

[Gavin Williamson]

I would be very disappointed if they were not to be made in the United Kingdom. My understanding is that the bomber pins are manufactured here in the United Kingdom.

Even as we pay tribute to the submariners, it is equally important that we think of their families, too—those who often have to go for months on end without hearing from their loved ones. We must also pay tribute to the thousands of industry experts who have played a vital role in this national endeavour.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Williamson]

I will make some progress. I am sure the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that.

The extent to which our deterrent underpins our special relationship with the United States must never be underplayed. We should be proud of the fact we are one of the few nations with both strategic nuclear and conventional carrier capabilities. We should be proud that those strengths give the United Kingdom influence not just in NATO but across the world, giving us the capability to influence events in our interest and stand up for our values and the United Kingdom.

My third point is that there are simply no credible alternatives to the submarine-based deterrent. Some claim that there are cheaper and more effective ways of providing a similar effect to the Trident system, but we have been down that road many times before. Successive studies by both Labour and Conservative Administrations have shown that there are no other alternatives. Most recently, the Trident alternatives review of 2013 found that submarines are less vulnerable to attack than silos or aircraft and can maintain a continuous posture in a way that aircraft and land-based alternatives cannot. Their missiles have greater range and capability than other alternative delivery systems. Overall, the review concluded that a minimum, credible, assured and independent deterrent requires nuclear submarines with ballistic missiles.

[John Spellar]

The Secretary of State is making a very compelling argument. Does he not therefore regret the dithering and delay that took place in the renewal of the submarine programme when the Conservatives were in coalition, at the behest of the Liberal Democrats, who have not even bothered to turn up today?

[Gavin Williamson]

We could spend a long time debating the Liberal Democrats, but it would probably be a waste of time. I am exceptionally proud of the fact that this Government have committed to a nuclear deterrent, and that in 2015 so many colleagues from both sides of the House united in one Lobby to make sure we delivered it.

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[Sir Michael Fallon (Sevenoaks) (Con)]

The only thing on which I agreed with the hon. Member for Glasgow South (Stewart Malcolm McDonald) was the tribute he took the trouble to pay at the beginning of his speech to the crews of the Polaris and Vanguard submarines. They have been the backbone of Operation Relentless, and the success of that operation is entirely dependent on the commitment of those who have conducted those patrols—in each case, an extraordinary service of perhaps three months or more.

There is no other service in the Navy quite like it, with submariners cut off from the outside world unlike in any part of the Royal Navy, unable to visit foreign ports or carry out different missions. They are isolated from their family and friends at all times in that three-month period. They are the stoics of the sea and we do owe them our gratitude. We should salute them all, past and present, and look again at how that service can be better recognised, but we should also tell them loudly from this House: thank you for helping keep us safe. They did keep us safe.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) said, it is extraordinary that some still argue that the nuclear deterrent is never used. It is used every minute of every hour of every day to ensure uncertainty in the mind of any aggressor towards this country. While we have nuclear weapons, they can never be sure what our response is likely to be. He reminded us that that was endorsed by a majority of 355 as recently as three years ago when we authorised the replacement of the Vanguard boats by the new Dreadnought submarines.

The Prime Minister and I set out the arguments for that renewal three years ago. I will not repeat them, but I want to make three further points. The threats we identified then, back in July 2016, have increased. First, Russia not only has intensified its rhetoric but is modernising its nuclear forces. It now has the ability to station nuclear missiles in its exclave at Kaliningrad, or indeed in the territory it now controls in Crimea. Secondly, since that debate, North Korea has carried out nuclear tests and is developing systems whereby nuclear warheads can be launched from both space and submarines. We should never forget that London is as close to North Korea as is Los Angeles. Thirdly, nuclear material is now coming within reach of terrorist groups that wish us and others harm. Our response must be relentless and resolute.

[John Spellar]

The right hon. Gentleman rightly drew attention to the overwhelming majority in this House in 2016. Does he now regret that his Government delayed so long in actually putting that decision to the House?

[Sir Michael Fallon]

Certainly in my period of office, I wanted that decision brought to the House as soon as possible. We were of course, as the right hon. Gentleman will recall, in a coalition Government, and we spent a lot of time trying to accommodate the wishes of our coalition partners. As he has already observed, that party has not even bothered to turn up to this debate.

It is of course important, each time we make these renewal decisions, that we emphasise our continuing commitment to the international work of non-proliferation. There is a particular responsibility on those countries that retain nuclear weapons to continue to commit to that treaty and to reduce the weapons they hold. That is why I reduced the number of warheads on each submarine from 48 to 40. The stockpile is reducing, and this country now holds only half the number of nuclear weapons it held 40 years ago. However, we also have to look ahead. It takes 13 to 14 years to put a new nuclear missile submarine into the water. If hon. Members believe, as I do, that there may still be a nuclear threat to this country in the 2030s, the 2040s and the 2050s all the way up to 2060, then it would of course be irresponsible not to renew the delivery mechanism—first the boats and then in time, perhaps later in this Parliament, the missile system itself.

Let me end with three final points. First, on the budget, of course it is true that the £31 billion, and the contingency alongside it, is spread over a very long period of construction, but, equally, it remains a very lumpy and sizeable part of the Department’s budget, and we do not get the advantages of scale—we replace only four boats each time—that the Americans are able to profit from when they are replacing many more submarines. There may be points in the work of the Public Accounts Committee and of others in this House that require us to look again at how the submarine renewal programme is actually financed year to year and to see whether there are economies of scale in forward buying some of the parts for all four submarines right at the beginning.

Secondly, as the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) said in challenging the hon. Member for Glasgow South, the NATO alliance is a nuclear alliance. If, sadly, Scotland ever became independent, he would be applying to join a nuclear alliance. In the arguments he put before the House, he seemed to have forgotten that many members of NATO signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty in the full knowledge that they would be protected by NATO’s nuclear umbrella. That is why they signed the treaty, as the hon. Lady pointed out. That means we need to keep reminding our allies in NATO of the importance of the nuclear planning group and of their commitment to maintaining their dual-use aircraft, and we need to remind their politicians and their publics that NATO is a nuclear alliance.

Thirdly, the point about independence, which was raised by the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes), is worth addressing. Of course it is true, as my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East said, that the system gives us—the UK, the United States and France—separate sources of decision making, making it even more difficult for potential aggressors to be sure of a single response. However, it is also important that this nuclear deterrent of ours is independent, because we cannot be sure of threats that may emanate simply against our shores and nobody else’s. That is why it is important that we keep our deterrent independent and that we satisfy ourselves that it is independent. Indeed, David Cameron and I separately took steps to reassure ourselves that the nuclear deterrent was independent. These are not details I can go into in public session, but it is important that the deterrent remains independent.

Let me conclude by saying yes, this deterrent was born of the cold war, but it is by no means a relic of the cold war. It is a key part of the defence of our country, and a key part of the defence of our freedoms and those of our allies. I am very sure that we need it now more than ever. I am equally sure that our successors in this place will, in 50 years’ time, be commending the successors of those crews who have helped to perform this arduous but essential duty.

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[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

The hon. Member for Glasgow South (Stewart Malcolm McDonald) said that he did not want to get involved in struggles with chimney sweeps, which seemed somehow a nod towards the concept of deterrence. However, as I am afraid is normal for contributions from the Scottish National party, he spent most of his speech attacking Labour party policy and the Labour party. It was more about internal politics in Scotland, I feel, than the national issue we are discussing.

My hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) made an excellent speech reaffirming current Labour party policy, in line with long-standing party policy and indeed the bipartisan policy of British Governments of both parties. My right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) drew attention to the Attlee-Bevan Government’s record in developing the nuclear deterrent; not, as seems to have been implied, in some bombastic gesture but in response to being cut off from nuclear information by the McMahon Act. They had to decide whether Britain was to maintain an independent capability, and they made the right decision.

Today, we are discussing the 50th anniversary of HMS Resolution, built under the Wilson Government, which first sailed in April 1969. As has been mentioned, under the last Labour Government, a resolution of this House was carried overwhelmingly to renew that capability. It is only a shame, as I said in interventions, that the Cameron coalition Government did not go through with that. That caused considerable delay and dislocation not only to the industry but to the operation of the CASD, which had to be maintained at considerably increased maintenance costs.

That, frankly, only reinforces my view of the previous Prime Minister, David Cameron: deep down, he was shallow. There was very little there. He believed in very little, and he allowed himself to be dragged around by the Liberal Democrats, while they pursued all sorts of fanciful alternatives for maintaining a nuclear deterrent, whether land-based or cruise missiles. It is interesting today that while there have been genuine and proper disagreements about whether we should have a nuclear deterrent at all, there has been no mention of those fanciful alternatives that were basically a way of kicking the can down the road. That seems to have been the default setting of Conservative Governments since 2010.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald]

I wonder if there is something we could agree on: the decision taken by Cameron and Osborne to depart from Labour’s practice of having funding for this programme outside of the Defence budget. Does the right hon. Gentleman think that was the right or wrong thing to do?

[John Spellar]

I could wax lyrical about the deficiencies of George Osborne’s stewardship of the Treasury, but probably not within the time allowed. I move on to the broader issue. My right hon. Friend rightly drew attention to the view that the collapse of the Soviet Union and end of the cold war rendered deterrence—and much of conventional defence—redundant. We had “Options for Change”, with huge dislocations. Frankly, when I came into the Defence Ministry in 1997, we were still dealing with the aftermath. If, however, we leave on one side any points about the issues then, it is now absolutely clear that a complacent attitude is no longer tenable. State and non-state threats have increased, are increasing, and need to be confronted and contained. Threats are a combination—are they not?—of capability, intention and doctrine. What we are seeing from Russia is a worrying and alarming increase in activity in all those areas. We are seeing the clear development of a nuclear doctrine in Russia, including in short-range, non-strategic nuclear weapons in the form of the Gerasimov doctrine.

The Defence Committee report, “Missile Misdemeanours: Russia and the INF Treaty”, goes into some detail about the several and continuing breaches of the INF treaty by Russia. Such breaches were agreed by all NATO states at the recent meeting of NATO Foreign Ministers, who made it very clear that, frankly, Russia is tearing up that agreement. Indeed, in response to the United States calling it out on this, Russia has also moved away from that treaty. I must say that that may have worrying implications for the strategic arms reduction treaty negotiations on strategic weapons, and we should be arguing—in NATO, but also in other forums—for maintaining those discussions. If Ronald Reagan could come to many such agreements, quite frankly, the United States should now be able to do so. Let us be clear, however, who is the prime instigator in breaching these agreements—it is Russia.

One of the things that worries me sometimes about these debates, including on the INF, is that for me they are very reminiscent of the time of the cruise missiles issue. People campaigned in this country against cruise missiles, and I always found it slightly perverse that they were more concerned with campaigning against the missiles pointing in the other direction than with campaigning against the SS-20s pointing in our direction. Those missiles were changing the strategic balance in Europe, which was why leading social democrat figures, such as Helmut Schmidt, were arguing for cruise missiles to maintain the balance and therefore to maintain peace in Europe, and were showing resolution in doing so.

We are also seeing such activities away from the nuclear field. We are seeing a preparedness to use force in Ukraine and Georgia, as well as cyber-attacks on the Baltic countries and massive exercises within the Baltic region. We have to be clear that, while nuclear is awful and almost unimaginable, conventional warfare is also awful. That was summed up by General Sherman in the 19th century when he said that “War is hell”. Yes, we all remember the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but that conflict also saw the firebombing of Tokyo, in which hundreds of thousands died, and the bombings of Hamburg and of Dresden, let alone the bombings on our own soil.

[Carol Monaghan]

Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that indiscriminate bombing is actually okay and an acceptable part of warfare?

[John Spellar]

Quite the opposite: I am saying that warfare results in devastation and a huge loss of life, as indeed we are seeing in Syria today. The hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) drew attention to the seminal work of Sir Michael Quinlan on nuclear strategy, and one of the points he made very strongly in all his works was that conventional warfare, particularly with modern technology, has awful consequences. We must therefore try to contain, if not abolish, warfare, and rather than just focus on one aspect of warfare, that is the important issue we have to address.

Some believe that maintaining the peace is achieved by disarmament or by pacifism. I argue that history demonstrates that peace is better maintained by preparedness and vigilance. That is why continuous at-sea deterrence has been so critical in keeping the peace for the past 50 years and why we owe so much to those who operate it around the clock and those who build it and maintain it around the country. It may be a silent service, but this anniversary gives us the opportunity to both acknowledge and praise it.

[Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)]

It is an absolute pleasure to follow what I thought was an excellent speech by the right hon. Member for Warley (John Spellar). He sums up the ethical as well as the practical case for why we need a continuous at-sea nuclear deterrent.

This has been a really good debate. I praise my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), the Chair of the Defence Committee, who set out very crisply why we need to do this and why it is so much in our strategic interest to make sure we have this level of protection. The right hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) referred to “The Silent Deep” by Hennessy and Jinks. That excellent book sets out the debt we owe to the technological brilliance of scientists and engineers; the political resolve of successive Governments and diplomats to ensure we acquire the technology; and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan) pointed out, the personal courage, sacrifice and professionalism of thousands of submariners and their families down the decades. Even as we speak, our forces are keeping us safe. As we sleep tonight, they will be keeping us safe. That is a debt that we can never really adequately repay and the least we can do is spend time in this House today to put on record our gratitude and thanks for their service.

Churchill referred to the Spitfire as a machine of colossal and shattering power. These submarines, in their own way, are our modern answer to that. It is a power that we all hope and pray will never have to be unleashed, but as the right hon. Member for Warley pointed out, the mere fact of its existence makes not just nuclear but all war less likely. If we think about the 1960s and 1970s and the superpower conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, it seems to me that it is almost inevitable at some point that that would have flared into a conflict had it not been prevented by the fact that the consequences of that conflict would have been unthinkable. The act of crossing into West Berlin would have come at too high a price to pay. That remains, still, the fundamental basis for why we need the deterrent.

In the world we live in today, Theodore Roosevelt’s adage to “walk softly and carry a big stick” seems never to have been more apposite. There is the presence, we must acknowledge, of real evil in our world. It is intense and increasingly unpredictable. Whether it be Iran, North Korea or Russia, we all know that there are malign forces in this world who will not act by the rules that we act by, who will not live by the values that we live by, and who set very little value in the sanctity or dignity of human life. That is what we are up against. That is the choice that, as democratic politicians in one of the most powerful countries in the world, it behoves us to make. We would be failing not just ourselves but the rest of the world were we to duck that responsibility.

There was a window in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union when we heard much talk about the peace dividend, but I am a great believer in what Vice-President Cheney said when he said that the “only dividend of peace is peace”. We should not in any way to attempt to do defence on the cheap, or without the resources and tools to make sure we can keep ourselves safe. That is why it is so welcome that the decision to launch the Successor class programme has been made. Indeed, as my right hon. Friend the Chair of the Select Committee and my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) pointed out, it is crucial that we get regular updates and focus on continuing that programme at pace. We cannot afford further slippage. Frankly, we are already at the limit of what we can expect the Vanguard class to continue to deliver.

It is also why we have brave Labour MPs on the Opposition Benches making the case for why we need the strategic nuclear deterrent. This is not a debate for partisanship.

[John Spellar]

I do not regard it as an act of outstanding courage to speak in support of long-standing and current Labour party policy.

[Mr Clarke]

I am absolutely delighted that the right hon. Gentleman regards this as an item of faith and that it will be pursued. However, the Leader of the Opposition, the shadow Chancellor, the shadow Home Secretary and indeed, the shadow Defence Secretary voted against the motion of 18 July 2016 in which this House pledged to renew the deterrent, so there is a question over this. Anyone who has seen—certainly in my part of the world—the actions of Labour activists and the noises they make will know that they do not suggest that this is in any way a question settled beyond doubt. That is important and I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Warley for making that case. This should come from both traditions.

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[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

It is a real pleasure and honour to follow the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan), because she speaks with real authority and eloquence about these issues. I am happy to speak as well in my capacity as chair of the cross-party group on nuclear disarmament. Let me put it on the record at the top of my speech that I am very happy to pay tribute to the submariners for their service to this country and to their families for the sacrifice that they make, which the hon. Lady has set out very clearly.

I do not think that there is any contradiction between paying tribute to that service and also being very clear that, for me, nuclear weapons are abhorrent. Others have said during this debate that it is inconsistent to have a nuclear deterrent if we are not prepared to use it. I absolutely agree with that, and I am very proud to say that I would not, under any circumstances, use nuclear weapons, and still less would I support the Prime Minister’s position of a first use of nuclear weapons. I believe that nuclear weapons are indiscriminate, illegal and obscene.

Let us just think what that first strike, which the Prime Minister was so proud not to rule out, could really mean. The heart of a nuclear explosion reaches a temperature of several million degrees centigrade. Over a wide area, the resulting heat flash literally vaporises all human tissue. At Hiroshima, within a radius of half a mile, the only remains of the people caught in the open were their shadows burned into stone. People inside buildings will be indirectly killed by the blast and the heat effects as buildings collapse and all inflammable materials burst into flames. The immediate death rate in that area will be over 90%. Individual fires will combine to produce a fire storm as all the oxygen is consumed. As the heat rises, air is drawn in from the periphery at or near ground level. This results in lethal hurricane-force winds and perpetuates the fire as the fresh oxygen is burned. The contamination will continue potentially for hundreds of thousands of years. The Red Cross has estimated that 1 billion people around the world could face starvation as a result of a nuclear war.

Let me be very clear: I hate all war, but there is something particular about nuclear war. Simply saying that it is in the same category as other forms of war is wrong. What is wrong as well is to say that we cannot uninvent things that have already been invented. We saw what happened when it came to chemical weapons, biological weapons and cluster munitions being banned. If there was more support from countries such as the UK, nuclear weapons could be banned as well. There was the UN treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons, and I found it frankly outrageous that the UK Government could not even be bothered to turn up to the talks. That was a campaign that was run throughout the world. One hundred and twenty two countries supported the nuclear ban treaty. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons won the Nobel peace prize for its efforts. The treaty is a strong and comprehensive text, with the potential to achieve a world without nuclear weapons. It opened for signature in September 2017 and will enter into force when 50 states have ratified it. It has so far been signed by 70 states and ratified by 22, and more and more are signing up.

I want to counter the argument made from the Labour Benches that the treaty is somehow not multilateral. It is, not least because there is no requirement for a country to join; there is no requirement on a country to have forgone their nuclear weapons before joining. If the UK had used its considerable clout on the world stage to have really shown some leadership on this issue, there could have been at least a chance of getting the countries around the table to have gone away and begun the process multilaterally of getting rid of their weapons.

[John Spellar]

The hon. Lady is very critical of the United Kingdom in this respect, but did Russia, China, France and the United States—in other words, the declared nuclear weapon states—attend either? Surely this is just another cul-de-sac, whereas the real way of reducing and eliminating nuclear weapons is through negotiations, primarily between Russia and the United States initially, but then involving all the nuclear weapon states. Is not that real politics, rather than gesture politics?

[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.

Oral Answers to Questions

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mark Lancaster]

I have been accused of many things in my life, but lacking courage is probably not one of them. If the hon. Lady knew anything about me, she would probably realise why that is the case. None the less, the issue remains a challenge and I am confident—as I have just said, recent figures show the highest number of applications on record in January—that the situation is improving.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

3. What steps his Department is taking to support the British defence industry after the UK leaves the EU.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Stuart Andrew)]

The UK defence industry is globally competitive and creates and contributes to jobs across the United Kingdom. I am confident that it will continue to thrive in the future. The Government are seeking the best possible deal for UK industry after exit. We support European collaboration on capability development and are promoting the invaluable contribution of UK industry.

[John Spellar]

That was a standard complacent reply from the Minister. Ministers are still hanging on to the mythology that EU regulations prevent them from supporting British industry, most recently with the fleet solid support ships. Of course, no one else in the EU holds on to that view or, indeed, behaves like that. However, as leaving the EU looms, will the Minister now show some decisiveness and backbone, instruct his officials to scrap the old discredited dogma and start putting British industry first?

Oral Answers to Questions

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 14th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

I join my hon. Friend in thanking the RAF for its work. It worked incredibly quickly to get to both Gatwick and Heathrow. Of course, our armed forces are always ready to respond, should they need to, but it should be said that responsibility for drone activity at civilian airports lies with the airport operators.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I have today received a parliamentary answer revealing that no Transport Minister visited Gatwick during the drone crisis. Can the hon. Gentleman tell us what contingency plans his own Department had for dealing with drones at airports? Will he also tell us on what date the Transport Department—or, indeed, the Cabinet Office—asked the MOD for help and support during the crisis? How did his Department respond, and when?

[Mr Speaker]

I say to the right hon. Gentleman in good spirit that he is uniquely talented in delivering an oral question as though it were of the written variety.

Oral Answers to Questions

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 26th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[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.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State make clear that there could be dangers here, with threats not only to the INF treaty but to the strategic arms reduction treaty—START—talks on strategic nuclear weapons? Will he also, along with his colleagues in NATO, present a united front on NATO’s assessment, and that of the United States, that Russia is in serious breach of the INF treaty? Will he urge the Americans—who have not, as far as I am aware, announced that they have withdrawn, but have announced an intention to withdraw—not to do so, but also make clear that this is not a reaction from Russia, but a reaction from the west to actions by Russia?

[Gavin Williamson]

The right hon. Gentleman’s assessment is absolutely accurate. This is a US reaction to Russia’s lack of compliance with its treaty obligations. It is important for the whole of NATO to speak with one voice and make clear to Russia that it must start complying with its treaty obligations.

UK Sovereign Capability

John Spellar Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Mr Sweeney]

Unit costs ought to come down but the problem is that the way that the shipbuilding strategy is defined makes it more likely that the cost reductions will not be maximised. That is a great shame, because it undermines the aspirations of the strategy.

I am a vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on shipbuilding and ship repair, and we hope to bring forward a report on the strategy very soon. It will highlight some of the opportunities to improve it, because we all share the same aspiration. We want to see a world-class industry in the UK that has the certainty to invest. We want a world-class product that is cost-effective enough to grow the size of the Royal Navy.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend rightly focuses on warships, but it is also about the civilian ships for the Ministry of Defence. Unlike every one of our European competitors, the Ministry of Defence stubbornly insists on advertising abroad. There is a point about maintaining a competent workforce and the drumbeat of production, as well as the supply chain and the supply ecosystem, which is so important for sustaining all the yards. Can my hon. Friend find a logical, rational explanation for why the Ministry of Defence refuses to behave like every other European naval country?

[Mr Sweeney]

My right hon. Friend’s point goes back to that made earlier about the Treasury’s behaviour. I feel that this is almost about an economic orthodoxy that drives behaviour and says that we must maximise competitive tendering for the sake of it, because there is some sort of axiom that it works because it does. That approach does not bear scrutiny. Shipbuilding has the highest barriers to entry of any major industry in the world. It is a hugely capital-intensive industry and the only way to make it work, and the only way to get to a world-class, market-dominant position—much like with aerospace, where, as we know, the Americans and Europeans built their own champions in the form of Airbus and Boeing—is by having that synergy between Government, industry and the research and development base that makes it work. That is what we ought to have with shipbuilding in the UK. Fragmenting it in the way proposed in the national shipbuilding strategy serves only to undermine the UK’s long-term sovereign capability in shipbuilding. It is the primary sovereign interest of the UK to have that capability. We are an island nation, a nation of islanders and shipbuilders, and we ought to maintain that capability.

There are critical issues at stake here. We have already heard that Appledore, owned by Babcock, is due to close in March, which will be a devastating blow to the local community and to the UK’s wider defence manufacturing base. It is yet another shipyard to fall. Once it falls, it will not recover and be reopened—that is a simple fact. Once it is gone, it is gone. Despite the recent contract announcement at Cammell Laird, it is also completing an HR1 notification form and making significant redundancies. That is very unfortunate, and speaks to the point about feast and famine. We cannot have these cycles in capacity any more; we need to smooth the cycle as much as possible.

In the context of major shipyard closures and significant downsizing, whether that is at Rosyth or Appledore, it is bizarre that the Government are quite happy to tender contracts overseas in international open competition. Under article 346 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union, the Government could quite easily designate the industry as UK-protected. It is entirely at their discretion. Any notion that their hands are tied is bogus. They could do that, smooth the production cycles and build a firm and stable footprint for UK shipyards, which would enable them to get match fit and then go out into the world and compete effectively for other orders. That is exactly what they do in Italy with Fincantieri, and what they do in France with DCNS. It is exactly what happens in Germany.

I do not understand why other European Union member states can achieve the same objectives much more effectively than us, but we are so holier than thou that it hurts when it comes to the zealous application of these EU rules and we seem to undermine our own industrial base and our prosperity as a result, meaning that communities are broken and skills lost. Ultimately, we undermine our objective of building a more resilient and effective industrial base to serve our defence industry and, potentially, commercial spin-offs.

Barrow-in-Furness is another example. The gap between the end of the Vanguard programme in the 1990s and the beginning of the Astute programme meant that the shipyard was essentially unable to build a submarine and they had to go to General Dynamics in the United States to be retaught how to build them. That is what we risk losing again if we are not careful.

[John Spellar]

It was surely not just the design capability and the managerial capability, but the actual day-to-day work experience and the work teams that have been created and then broken up. It took 12 to 24 months to rebuild that capability and was hugely expensive. The Ministry of Defence and the Treasury have still not learnt that lesson.

[Mr Sweeney]

My right hon. Friend makes a very prescient point. There is no calculation of the opportunity cost when those skills are lost or of how much it costs to build them back up. The feast and famine cycle is hugely costly and inefficient, and the national shipbuilding strategy risks going back to that pattern. I think that is a critical point that the Minister really ought to address in his remarks about the national shipbuilding strategy.

Let me make it clear that we are all here to try to deliver the best outcome for defence infrastructure in the UK—we are trying to get to the same end goal. We are trying to offer the best of our understanding and experience of these issues to inform this document and improve it as much as we can, and it is fair to say that we want to achieve the same objectives.

We have also seen the development of a combat air strategy—the Tempest programme—which is laudable and looks promising, but there is a lack of an overarching objective on defence. We have already lost the capacity to build large fixed-wing aircraft through the cancellation of the Nimrod programme, which was done hastily by the disastrous 2010 strategic defence and security review and means that we have permanently lost that capability in the UK. Similarly, we have lost the capacity to build main battle tanks.

What else is at risk, and where is the risk profile of the sovereign capabilities that will be lost? What is expendable and what is indispensable? That is not defined in the national shipbuilding strategy, where there is talk of potentially putting the Type 31e combat management system out to international tender. Why do we not define what the key sovereign capability is—not just in the shipbuilding programme, but in aspects of its critical supply chain, including gearboxes, gas turbines, combat management systems, weapons systems and so on? We need to have that granularity of detail in the national shipbuilding strategy, but it is not there. That leaves it open to interpretation and extreme gerrymandering by the Ministry of Defence.

Those are the key issues that we have to highlight, whether they are across land, maritime—I am biased towards maritime, which I have focused on heavily—or aerospace. I am sure that other Members are willing to contribute and add their own thoughts to this debate, but essentially that is an overview of my main concerns about our UK sovereign capability and the risks to sustaining it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Sweeney) on securing this debate. He emphasised the lack of strategy on maritime sovereign capability, but we need to ask the broader question of why we are in this mess today.

Since 2010, this Government have had no industrial strategy on defence. Some of the short-term decisions that were taken in 2010, when the Government slashed the defence budget by 16%, have resulted in capability gaps. A revolving door has been put on the office of the Minister for Defence Procurement, which means that they have a life expectancy a bit longer than a mayfly. That is not helpful when we need a champion in that role who can argue against the Treasury.

Why is sovereign capability important? If we want to have certain capabilities for the defence of our nation, we need to invest in them. The right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field) has raised the issue of defence exports. He is right to say that if we are to nourish that industry, there is a defence export role to it. The Ministry of Defence and the Treasury have adopted Donald Trump’s mantra of “Make America great again”, because the procurements that have taken place are suggestive of an “America first” strategy. In the past few years, they have procured more than $8 billion-worth of contracts from the United States.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East and my right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) both said, those procurements were not put out to contract; they were simply awarded. There were no competitions. We have the Apache contract and the P-8 contract—direct foreign military sales—and we have the scandalous situation of the airborne warning and control system, or AWACS, and I understand the Department is now going down the Wedgetail route. From talking to colleagues in NATO, I know that the Ministry of Defence has had no role, and nor is it interested, in partnering the programme that is replacing the 15 AWACS NATO aircraft. It is going down the Boeing route again. I am not sure whether soon we will have a sign at the Ministry of Defence’s Main Building saying, “Sponsored by Boeing”, but that seems to be the way it is going.

We also have the joint light tactical vehicle contract that was awarded to Oshkosh, with £1 billion of sales to replace armoured vehicles. There was no competition at all. At the same time, the Ministry of Defence and the Treasury are saying that the contract has to go out to competition. This is dangerous for our capability. It is not just about jobs, which are important, but about our supply chain and investment in research and development in our technology. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East will not remember the Falklands war, where we faced the issue of kit procurement from abroad. It reached a situation where we wanted to use the kit independently but were told that we could not.

I have serious concerns about this off-the-shelf approach to defence strategy, because there is no commitment at all. It would not happen in any other country—it would certainly not happen in the United States. If we were to sell equipment to the United States, there would have to be some offset in terms of jobs or investment there. This Government have not even tried. They trumpet the £100 million going into Lossiemouth, but that would have had to go anywhere. Boeing is going round on a public relations exercise, with glossy adverts that say it is now a British company, but it is not. There is very little evidence of real investment going into jobs and technology. That is not just today; our technology in this important sector is in long-term decline.

The hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), who is no longer in her place, said that there is no indication that the Treasury or the Ministry of Defence recognises that if a contract is awarded in this country, the money will come back straightaway. That is a serious problem for them. Short-term decisions taken now will have long-term implications for our effectiveness not just at maintaining our sovereign capability in a whole host of areas including shipbuilding, which has been outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East, but at maintaining our capability to use that kit in certain situations. For example, will we be able to get the upgrades on Apaches if a future US Government determine that we should not? That is why we need sovereign capability.

I hate to use the phrase “go back to basics”, but that is what the Treasury and the Ministry of Defence need to do. They need to make it clear that we need to procure and manufacture in the UK under sovereign capability, which should be the starting point for the defence industrial strategy. We have been promised it by the revolving door of Ministers for Defence Procurement, but it has never been put in place. It has to be a joined-up approach across Government that includes the prosperity agenda, which does not seem to matter when it comes to those huge contracts that have been awarded without competition. When there is a situation such as the fleet solid support ship contract, where we could have investment in UK jobs and prosperity, we put it out to foreign competition. My right hon. Friend the Member for Warley is right: no other nation in Europe would do such a thing.

[John Spellar]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Kevan Jones]

I am sorry; I am running out of time.

This scandal needs to be highlighted. I hope the Minister, in the time he has got in his new role, stands up to the knee-jerk “America first” reaction.