Nuclear-powered Submarines

Angus Robertson Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Angus Robertson (Moray) (SNP)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the new £1.1 billion Ministry of Defence nuclear submarine contract.

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Philip Hammond)]

Before I answer, I am sure the whole House would wish to join me in paying tribute to Lance Corporal James Ashworth of 1st Battalion the Grenadier Guards, who was killed in Afghanistan on Wednesday, and Corporal Alex Guy of 1st Battalion the Royal Anglian Regiment, who was killed in Afghanistan on Friday. Our thoughts are with their families and friends at this difficult time.

The UK currently operates two fleets of nuclear-powered submarines: the Trafalgar class of attack submarines, which will be replaced over the next 10 years by the Astute class, and the Vanguard class strategic missile submarines. The Government’s policy is that the Vanguard class will be replaced at the end of its life in the late 2020s by a successor strategic missile submarine carrying the Trident missile, subject to a main gate investment approval for the project in 2016. In the meantime, long-lead items and design work for the successor submarine have been commissioned.

I have today announced by written ministerial statement that we are investing £1.1 billion over the next 11 years in a programme of work which includes redeveloping the Rolls-Royce factory in Derby where all our submarines’ nuclear power plants are designed and built, and in maintaining the skills necessary to do so. This investment will secure the jobs of 300 highly skilled workers and will ensure that we retain the capability to build submarine nuclear power plants in the UK. I am sure the House will join me in welcoming this announcement as good news for the people of Derby, good news for the Royal Navy and good news for the country as a whole.

[Angus Robertson]

I join in the condolences extended by the Secretary of State, as I am sure does everybody in the House.

I am grateful for the statement, which the Government wanted to give only in written form and not directly to the Chamber. It is striking that they were prepared to announce spending £1.1 billion in just 22 lines of text, and doing it in such a way that MPs could not ask follow-up questions. It is shameful.

This announcement paves the way for Trident renewal and it does so in the face of opposition in Scotland. The majority of MPs from Scotland and the majority of Members of the Scottish Parliament have voted against Trident renewal. The Scottish Government are opposed to Trident, the Scottish Trades Union Congress is opposed to Trident, the Church of Scotland is opposed, the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland is opposed, the Episcopal Church of Scotland is opposed, the Muslim Council of Scotland is opposed, and, most important, the public of Scotland are overwhelmingly opposed to the renewal of Trident. A YouGov poll in 2010 showed 67% opposed, as against only 13%. There was majority opposition among the voters of all four mainstream parties in Scotland, including Conservative voters and Liberal Democrat voters. The Westminster Government are aware of the objections but are ploughing on regardless. Then, at the end, they plan to dump this next generation of weapons of mass destruction on the Clyde. It is an affront to democracy and an obscene waste of money.

Will the Secretary of State confirm that he is prepared to spend £1 billion on weapons of mass destruction, which can never be used, while at the same time he is planning to cut regiments, battalions and thousands of jobs of brave service personnel whose irreplaceable services are regularly used? Does he acknowledge that, with Treasury assumptions and standard economic modelling, a capital expenditure of £1.1 billion on infrastructure projects would support 10,000 jobs directly and an additional 4,900 jobs through indirect purchases: 14,900 jobs, compared with only the 300 he lauded today? This morning on the radio the Minister for the Armed Forces said

“if we decide in 2016 not to go ahead with some of these engines the government of the day would have to negotiate its way out of that.”

What costs would the taxpayer incur if approval was not granted in 2016, and what will the total cost of all long-lead items amount to by 2016?

[Mr Hammond]

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman resorts, not for the first time, to hyperbole. He talks about weapons of mass destruction, but the announcement has nothing to do with weapons; it is about reactor power plants for powering submarines, both the strategic successor submarine and the Astute class attack submarine, which will form the core of the Navy’s attack submarine force in future. He talks about the position of the Scottish National party and the Scottish TUC. Perhaps he has taken the trouble to consult the 6,000 people whose jobs depend on Her Majesty’s naval base Clyde and Coulport.

The hon. Gentleman asked about the review in 2016. We decided to proceed with long-lead items to enable the currently planned programme for the replacement of the Vanguard class submarine to proceed. A decision will be taken in 2016. It will take into account the review of alternatives to the successor, which is currently under way and being chaired by the Minister for the Armed Forces. We understand from speculation in the media that the SNP is about to reverse its policy on membership of NATO, which is a nuclear alliance, so perhaps he could enlighten us on whether his party will endorse the nuclear NATO alliance, because he did not tell the House in his earlier comments.