RAF: Operational Conversion Unit

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Tuesday 8th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, perhaps the Minister will consider reopening the base in Belize as part of the reconsideration? I declare an interest as president of the All-Party Group for Belize.

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, we recognise the utility of Belize as a training area, and it is indeed one of the options we are looking at.

Strategic Defence and Security Review

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, the Army Reserve, as it is now known, is currently 28,080 and our target is to reach 30,000 by 2020.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, on configuration, why do we have 40 admirals and all their attendant costs? Would not that money be better spent on the front line?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I would refer the noble Lord and noble Lords in general to the Written Answer I gave on that very subject the other day, which explains that the number of admirals should not be taken in the context of the Royal Navy alone but in the much wider context of our NATO commitments and other commitments around the world.

Defence Estate

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

I am grateful to my noble friend. In a sense, considerations for the Reserve Forces cannot be separated from those for Regular Forces because, with the whole force concept, training is now taking place with regulars and reservists side by side, which is entirely appropriate. I am aware that Bassingbourn’s future use has been the subject of a great deal of speculation, but I cannot inform my noble friend in detail about the site. Again, if I can enlighten him in writing I am happy to do so.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, will the Minister confirm that the welcome announcement about the development of an infantry centre in Edinburgh, the improvements at Lossiemouth, his earlier announcement on the Royal Regiment of Scotland and the announcement made last week about the frigates on the Clyde are all possible only because the people of Scotland two years ago rejected separation, and that it is part of the welcome union dividend?

[Earl Howe]

The noble Lord makes a very good point, and I agree. It enables us as a department to commit to an enduring defence presence in Scotland through a number of programmes. As he is aware, we have now committed to building eight type-26 global combat ships on the Clyde. We are investing more than £500 million in the infrastructure and capability of the naval base at Clyde as it becomes the home of all Royal Navy submarines by 2020. We are investing in the expansion of RAF Lossiemouth, so that it will be home to at least one additional Typhoon squadron, as well as the maritime patrol aircraft. We are investing in concentrating some Army capabilities in Leuchars Station. That will improve access to suitable training areas. Across a whole range of projects, Scotland will benefit.

War Pensions: Uprating

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, the triple lock applies only to the basic state pension. Members of the Armed Forces will therefore benefit from the triple lock once they reach state pension age, but there are broader issues to be considered here. One is that maintaining parity with social security disability benefits is in principle the right thing to do, but secondly, there is the affordability issue. As a Government and, I believe, as a nation, we have to stick with the long-term economic plan and we have to continue to live within our means.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

Is the Minister not surprised that no Conservatives are rising to their feet to defend our servicemen? They are quite prepared to go along and lay a wreath and to go on marches, but when it comes down to it, the Minister gave it away: he said the word “affordability”. These are people for whom we must afford to uprate their disabled benefits, along with pensions; otherwise, we are really not honouring the memory of those who died for our country and served it so well.

[Earl Howe]

As I have explained, we do uprate the war pensions scheme, in line with the CPI, which is exactly the measure used by the DWP for all disability benefits, so those people are not disadvantaged.

Royal Navy

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Thursday 5th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I am sure the Russians are in no doubt of the capability that the Royal Navy can demonstrate. The Royal Navy has a robust range of measures in place for detecting and shadowing non-NATO naval units which may seek to enter our territorial waters without prior authority. We continue to develop new detection capabilities to maintain the operational advantage that we need. The strategic defence and security review currently under way will allow us to assess the full spectrum of submarine detection capability, including the utility of fixed-wing maritime patrol aircraft.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, my noble friend has revealed how many operational ships there are in the Royal Navy. Will the Minister tell us how many admirals there are?

[Earl Howe]

As with manning numbers on ships, the number does vary. I will write to the noble Lord.

Defence: UK Territorial Waters

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Tuesday 24th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, the severe pressure on the public finances in 2010 and the urgent need to bring the defence programme into balance meant that we could not retain all our existing programmes and that we had to prioritise between capabilities. The aircraft’s future high support costs were a clear factor in that decision. It is also well known that the MRA4 project suffered from repeated delays and cost overruns, and was still suffering from technical problems in 2010.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, further to the Minister’s answer to my noble friend Lord Soley, we all understand that defence is a reserved matter, but would it not be sensible to let the First Minister of Scotland know the threats from Russia so that we get a more sensible policy in relation to the Trident nuclear deterrent?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes a very good point and I will make sure that my department passes that on to the Scotland Office.

Ukraine

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, we are providing non-lethal assistance that has been requested by the Ukrainian Government to enhance the capability of their armed forces, enabling them to defend themselves better and to reduce the number of fatalities and casualties that they are suffering. All this training will be conducted well away from the conflict zone in the east.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

Does the Minister recall that Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons in return for guarantees of territorial integrity from a number of countries, including Russia. Will he remind the people of this country, particularly the SNP, of that fact?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I do recollect the point the noble Lord made, and I agree entirely with what he says.

Scottish Independence: Faslane

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 3rd March 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My noble friend makes a very good point. The Ministry of Defence spent more than £20 billion with UK industry in 2011-12, with a £160 billion, 10-year equipment programme. Companies based in an independent Scotland would no longer be eligible for contracts that the UK chose to place domestically for national security reasons. Where they could continue to compete, they would be pitching for business in an international market dominated by major economic powers.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister not understand that this is an important matter, and that there is a big difference between pre-negotiation and contingency planning?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I cannot add anything to what I have already said.

Territorial Army

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Wednesday 17th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My noble friend makes a good point. Working with local communities is vital. We are very grateful for the support that reservists and, indeed, regulars receive from their local communities, and we hope that this will continue. While we are vacating a small number of sites, we will retain more than 300 locations across the UK where individuals can undertake service in the Army Reserve.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a former member of the Territorial Army. I know that that surprises some people opposite. I may be a bit simple, but could the Minister explain the logic, when the Government are seeking to increase the number of members of the Territorial Army, of closing TA centres?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I am not at all surprised that the noble Lord was in the Territorial Army. He has that military demeanour, and cut a fine dash when he came into the Ministry of Defence the other day. We need to expand the Army Reserve to reflect the future liability of 30,000 trained reservists. To deliver that, the supporting structure needs to be changed. We are confident that the Army Reserve will continue to demonstrate its ability to adapt to new requirements.

Defence: Carrier Strike Capability

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Thursday 10th May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

No, my Lords, I do not think that it is short-termism. We are in very good company with the B-variant. The US Marine Corps uses it; it is buying a lot of Joint Strike Fighters. The Italians are also going to buy them for their carrier. It is not short-termism at all.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My Lords, although everyone seems happy that we are now back on the right track, can the Minister give us an estimate of the extra abortive expenditure involved in the unnecessary adventure of cat and trap?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I have already given an answer to the second question. I will read it out again, but before I do I must say that I am very grateful to the noble Lord for assuring me that we are on the right track. I said that at the end of April we had committed £39 million to conversion investigations and a further £1 million to an air-to-air refuelling study. We do not consider that money to have been wasted. Changing variant was considered the best course of action at the time of the SDSR and those costs were necessarily incurred. Without a detailed investigation of the impact of carrier conversion, we would not have been in a position today to identify the significant rise in estimated costs and to decide to call a halt to the programme.