Defence: Military Commitments

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Monday 4th April 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, the Government’s primary responsibility is to ensure national security. Without healthy finances, we cannot create the public services or the national security we need. The SDSR established the policy framework for the Armed Forces and the capabilities that they will need to meet future challenges. Events in Libya have proved how right we were to design adaptability into defence so that we are able to be flexible as strategic threats change. The outstanding work of our Armed Forces demonstrates that Britain remains a key player that is able to project power and influence on the world stage.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, from these Benches, we associate ourselves with the Minister’s words of tribute to Major Matthew Collins and Lance Sergeant Mark Burgan of the Irish Guards. We too offer our sincere condolences to their families and hope that their pain will be eased a little by the knowledge that, in the eyes of the nation as well as of this House, Major Collins and Lance Sergeant Burgan are brave and courageous heroes.

We now have commitments in Libya that were not anticipated or even contemplated in the recent rushed strategic defence and security review, which has not survived its first encounter with reality. As a result, we have aircraft—and certainly one naval vessel—in theatre that were due to be decommissioned. Is it not time for the validity and relevance of the SDSR to be reviewed in the light of what is happening in north Africa and the new commitments that we have taken on? Is it not also the case that, if the Government decide to extend further our operational commitments, they have a responsibility to provide the additional resources and not leave our Armed Forces even more stretched than ever, as appears to be the case from the comments this morning by the head of the Royal Air Force?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I agree with every word that the noble Lord said about the two brave soldiers from the Irish Guards.

The SDSR states explicitly the need for an adaptable posture to defend our interests in the world. As a result, we have structured and resourced our forces to give us flexibility to conduct operations such as the one in Libya. The SDSR correctly predicted that we would need to carry out civilian evacuations, and rightly assessed that we could mitigate capability gaps resulting from the SDSR through working with allies, overflight and basing rights. We are continuing to develop and refine the SDSR, but it will not be reopened. Finally, the additional costs of operations in Libya will be fully met from the reserve.