Military Action Overseas: Parliamentary Approval

Debate between Angus Brendan MacNeil and Johnny Mercer

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer (Plymouth, Moor View) (Con)]

Thank you for granting this debate today, Mr Speaker. I think everybody knows my position, but I want to lay it out clearly. I profoundly disagree with many Members when it comes to a potential war powers Act, which would be an act of calamitous insanity for our foreign policy. I am going to make it very clear why I think that and why the Prime Minister has done absolutely the right thing, and I ask Members to hear my remarks in context.

I have done the other side of the veil. I have operated at the highest possible strategic level for this country on operations, and I must be honest: if we are to continue to have the freedom to manoeuvre and the opportunity to keep this country safe, we cannot enshrine these powers of the Prime Minister in a war powers Act.

First, there are the practical reasons. It is absolutely right that some aspects of intelligence in this country will never be made public. Why? Because the way we gather them is a secret, and our opponents do not know how we gather them. If we bring them out into the public domain, we expose that capability and we make this country less safe, simply so we can have a say in this House on foreign policy. That is not right.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Johnny Mercer]

I will not give way. I have heard a lot of the arguments in this House.

The speed and secrecy that we try to uphold in military operations cannot be curtailed by decision making. Should Parliament have a say? Should Parliament have a debate? Should MPs be listened to? Are MPs important in this debate? Absolutely, but when it comes to the defence of this nation and the defence of the freedoms and privileges that we in this House live up to and enjoy every day, we cannot retrospectively inhibit the people who fight for them by introducing a war powers Act.

This country has a role to play on the global stage. Think for a moment of the Americans and the French and of how we would look when they ask us in the dead of night, in that last decision-making process, whether or not we will stand shoulder to shoulder with them in some of these highly contentious operations. Do we want our Prime Minister to have in the back of her mind, “I’ve got to go to Parliament and I may lose a vote, so therefore I am not going to do the right thing for the country”? Or do we want to empower her to do the right thing in the British national interest to keep this country safe?