Education: Industrial Strategy

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 24th June 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

My Lords, I am concerned about funding for further education. I believe that it needs to be a priority in the spending review; I have said that publicly, as recently as last week at the Wellington Festival of Education. We need to put more emphasis on that and to ensure that we are developing the skills base we need for the next generation.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister not think that when the youngsters at these colleges look at our shipbuilding strategy—which is part of the industrial strategy—they will be surprised that the shipbuilding strategy does not involve any ships being ordered?

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

My Lords, shipbuilding is a long-standing and noble industry in this country, and we will continue to encourage it. However, we are in a globalised world, and it is a priority that we encourage skills in the areas that are growing most rapidly.

Education: GCSE Music

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

My noble friend is absolutely right. To link this for a moment to EBacc, I believe that a sense of history and music come together. Many noble Lords who have listened to the “Miserere” will know that Mozart went to hear that in the Vatican aged 14, memorised it and took it back and published it for the outside world because the Vatican had chosen to keep it to itself. Beethoven wrote five piano concertos, the “Missa Solemnis” and his ninth symphony when he was totally deaf. That gives a very different understanding of music when you listen to it, so history and music stand together.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a patron of the Docklands Sinfonia. I support what the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, said. This sinfonia, which is based in the East End, very often goes out to schools in the Tower Hamlets area because there are insufficient music teachers. This is wonderful and important to do because it stops people in gangs killing each other with knives. There is clearly something wrong. There is not enough chance to learn music at school if they are having to do this.

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

I referred earlier to the percentage of teacher time allocated to music, so I do not think this is the problem. I accept there are challenges in areas of disadvantage, which is why we have launched the In Harmony programme. This is working in six of our most disadvantaged areas. We are already seeing quantitative and qualitative evidence to suggest that children’s musical enjoyment has improved through the involvement of In Harmony. It is popular among its participants and we will be carrying out a further evaluation next September to see if we can widen its scope.

Brexit: Gibraltar

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Tuesday 21st March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, I first visited Gibraltar by sea in September 1948 and have done so dozens of times since, and I know it well. I intend to speak only on the military significance of Gibraltar to the United Kingdom, the United States and NATO in this troubled and ever more chaotic and dangerous world.

Gibraltar commands one of the world’s seven key strategic global choke points for maritime trade. It is a southern outpost of Europe facing the north African littoral, from which we are able to monitor all surface and sub-surface traffic through the strait, and it is important in tension and war but also in combating terrorism. One thousand miles closer to the Mediterranean, the Middle East, the South Atlantic and the West Indies than the United Kingdom, its strategically important location has proved invaluable for three centuries.

With large dry docks, as well as oil fuel and ammunition storage supported by air links to the UK, its maintenance capability has proved of crucial importance on numerous occasions. Gibraltar’s naval docks and storage facilities are important today, with British and US nuclear submarines frequently visiting the Z-berths. Indeed, the US would like to make more use of Gibraltar, preferring it for security reasons to Rota, but it is constrained by the Spanish attitude to such visits.

Gibraltar’s position makes it important in combating Islamic terrorism based in the Sahel or north African littoral. It is also a useful base from which to conduct trials and training in rather more benign sea conditions than are found around the western UK. Our military presence on the Rock has been reduced to a minimum but is sufficient to ensure maintenance of sovereignty. Having said that, I believe that the Gibraltar squadron boats need to be rather more powerful and heavier, so possibly should be enhanced.

The constant infringement of Gibraltar’s territorial seas by Spanish vessels is completely inexcusable, not least as she is a NATO ally. It is to be hoped that Brexit will not be used as a reason to heighten tensions, because it is extremely dangerous when you do that sort of thing: things can escalate and go beyond what anyone wanted.

In purely military terms, Gibraltar and its brave, resolute people are important to the security and stability of our nation and NATO in this very dangerous world.

Armed Forces: East of Suez

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Thursday 9th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, there is no question but that the UK and US military facility in Diego Garcia contributes significantly towards regional and global security. The UK footprint may not be major in size, but it represents a significant contribution to our bilateral defence and security relationship with the US. At the moment the Royal Navy has 41 personnel permanently deployed in Diego Garcia, with a capacity to surge that for contingent operations in the wider region from 2021. That could include a carrier strike task group, should the situation change.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con)]

My Lords, we will hear from the noble Lord, Lord West, and then from my noble friend.

[Lord West of Spithead]

My Lords, a carrier battle group is the perfect platform for power projection east of Suez, but whenever one goes east of Suez one might be going in harm’s way. A carrier battle group is not a carrier on its own. When I took a battle group to the Far East for the Hong Kong withdrawal, it was 14 ships, including two nuclear attack submarines, because of those sorts of risks. Does the Minister really believe there is sufficient money in the naval programme to ensure adequate support shipping for a carrier operating in the Far East?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

Yes, indeed. The noble Lord will know that these matters are kept constantly under review. The new class of Queen Elizabeth carriers are going to be the biggest and most powerful warships ever built for the Royal Navy, so the capability is certainly there. Their deployment to the Gulf will depend very much on what the demand will be.

Armed Forces: Capability

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, Russia, a superpower in nuclear terms, is massively investing in military capability, yet with the financial clout of Italy. Its economy is on a war footing: something has to give. There are its actions in Crimea and Ukraine, and now threats to the Baltic states and cyberattacks in Estonia, France, Turkey, Ukraine and the USA. There is aggressive intrusion into NATO air space and near misses. Russian nuclear submarines are threatening our SSBNs. Why is Russia doing all this? Putin is a revisionist, believes in spheres of influence and understands hard power. His loose talk of the use of nuclear weapons is a particular concern. We must strain every sinew to understand him and keep open a dialogue.

There is instability in the Middle East. It is difficult to identify a country that is not in turmoil—Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya—and countries such as Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Egypt are under severe strain. The flexing of muscles by Iran and Turkey, as regional powers; the Sunni/Shia divide; Russia’s recent success as a key power broker—where will this all go?

The threat of terrorism, grown as a result of events in the Middle East, is not at present existential, but should terrorists ever get hold of improvised nuclear devices or a lethal virus, all that changes. Afghanistan is still at risk of collapse. Stability in nuclear-armed Pakistan is still a cause for concern. In Korea, will the US allow Kim Jong-un to develop a functioning ballistic nuclear-tipped missile able to strike the US? I doubt it very much. What then?

China is threatening freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, there is the Senkaku Islands stand-off with Japan and the re-emergence of the Taiwan issue. That is all made more worrying by the stalling of China’s economy. As the largest European investor in that region, with responsibility for global shipping, can we ignore it?

Then there is cyber. The growing reliance of our society and military on the internet entails lots of vulnerabilities that were not foreseen. The Russian takedown of a French television station, had it been a bomb, would have been an act of war, but nations do not know how to respond as there are no international agreements. All I would say is that some rather naive politicians in the Treasury think this means that we can save money on defence; it actually means that we will have to spend more.

In the face of these threats—and there are others—what have the Government done? They have shown staggering complacency and self-delusion, when it is quite clear to experts and lay men that defence needs more resources. When in coalition, they reduced our military capability by 30%, and our forces remain underfunded. There is minimal new money. It is in theory being produced by efficiencies. The HCDC has pointed out the creative accounting in the 2% of GDP spent on defence, the figure that the Government gave. Spending on pensions does not win wars, and the 2% of GDP is not the target but the very minimum that any NATO nation should spend. Our nation should spend more.

Having robust defence forces makes a war involving our nation less likely. If a small conflagration in a distant part of the world developed into a war that threatened our national survival, the best welfare provision, National Health Service, education and foreign aid programmes in the world would be as nothing. Preventing war, and defending our nation and people if it happens, are more important than any other government spending priorities. If Ministers get defence wrong, the nation will never forgive them. The costs in blood and treasure are enormous. The Government have a choice of whether we spend what is required to ensure the safety of our nation, dependencies and people or not. At present, I believe they are getting the choice wrong.

The US military and, to a lesser extent, ours, have together ensured that there has been no world war for more than 70 years. The US now expects us and others to step up; it is right that we do so. It is no use the Government pretending otherwise. There is not enough money in defence. In particular, notwithstanding the Defence Secretary calling this the year of the Navy, the Navy has too few ships to do what the nation expects. Our great nation has effectively only 11 escorts fully capable of operations, which is a national disgrace. Delays in ordering the Type 26 frigate have led to the ordering of extra, highly overpriced offshore patrol vessels to fill the Clyde yard with work, because there is an agreement that we will subsidise the yard whether ships are being made at all or not.

However, I congratulate the Government on their commitment to the deterrent successor programme, but I and many others believe that the capital cost of the programme should be met from the central contingency fund. Does the noble Earl agree?

The really good news in defence is the new aircraft carriers, welcomed and eagerly awaited by the US and our other allies. The Government must purchase enough Sea Lightnings to have the squadrons on board. I was very surprised to see articles in the papers recently about mothballing the second carrier and the date for the “Queen Elizabeth” slipping. I end by asking the noble Earl to confirm that the “Prince of Wales” will be completed and operated concurrently with the “Queen Elizabeth”, and that HMS “Queen Elizabeth”, will sail in March for sea trials and enter Portsmouth for the first time before the summer, as previously stated by the Defence Secretary?

Education: English Baccalaureate

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I would be delighted to do that.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

The Minister will be aware of the huge shortage of engineers in this country and, particularly, in the Navy, Air Force and Army. What is being done to translate that increase in science and maths into engineering and to try to encourage that?

[Lord Nash]

I know that we have a number of UTCs specialising in that, including one where I know that the Royal Navy is actively engaged.

Education: Academy Chains

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Wednesday 15th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I believe that a number of noble Lords do send their children to such schools, and I hope that in time, because of the success of the entire state programme, many more will.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, bearing in mind the history curriculum that is taught in academy schools, does the Minister agree with his Secretary of State, who wrote in a recent article that those on the left were unpatriotic?

[Lord Nash]

I applaud my right honourable friend the Secretary of State’s objectivity in all matters.