Defence: Trident Review

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Tuesday 9th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I have no doubt that when the Trident alternatives review is published, it will stimulate a good deal of, I hope, informed and rational debate about the future of our nuclear weapons programme and of nuclear weapons as a whole. That was part of the intention of commissioning this review.

[Lord West of Spithead]

My Lords, unsurprisingly, the alternatives review that the Minister refers to seems to show that are no real alternatives to replacing the Vanguard class submarines if we wish to maintain our best-value and most capable deterrent. The only thing that will be looked at further is continuous sea deterrent and, even in that, the worst probability is that we will have to order two Vanguard replacements. With that in mind, will the Minister not agree that we should order those two replacements now, to remove the uncertainty hanging over many hundreds—indeed, over 1,000—skilled workers and their families about their future, and to save £300 million?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I am not sure that major defence decisions should be driven either by the need to employ a large number of people to build aircraft carriers in Scotland or by the need to maintain employment in Barrow-in-Furness. There are larger issues at stake.