Debate on the Address

Debate between Angus Robertson and Julian Lewis

Wednesday 18th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Angus Robertson]

My hon. Friend is a doughty campaigner for his constituents on that and makes his case well. The Prime Minister is sitting on the Treasury Bench and I hope he was listening because, given what was promised in 2014 in the run-up to the Scottish referendum, it would be intolerable if he went back on the commitments made at that time.

On foreign affairs, I would like a return to something that was said not that long ago: that the UK should have an ethical foreign policy. I am profoundly troubled by the way in which the United Kingdom sells weapons that are used in armed conflict. The people who use the weapons are trained by the UK military, fly planes produced in the United Kingdom, and fire weapons made in the United Kingdom. Currently, that is being done by Saudi Arabia in Yemen. The time has come better to regulate weapons trading. The Government should have brought forward a weapons trading Bill but they have not. We should end our existing arms deals with Saudi Arabia, following the example of our European neighbours. We should have an ethical foreign policy and the Government should pursue it. Sadly, they do not.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Angus Robertson]

I made a commitment that I would not emulate the leader of the Labour party by speaking for 41 minutes, and I am running the risk of doing so.

[Angus Robertson]

Thank you for your correction, Mr Speaker. In that case, I am delighted to give way to the right hon. Gentleman.

[Dr Julian Lewis]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who is, as always, very courteous in these matters.

The right hon. Gentleman began by talking about some of the areas where he might agree with the Prime Minister. Before he concludes, will he answer this question? Does he agree with the Prime Minister on the question of extremism and indoctrination in our country? The Scottish National party has a very good record in opposing Daesh and everything it stands for. Does he agree that what the Prime Minister said was encapsulated by the late, great philosopher, Sir Karl Popper, in the paradox of tolerance? He said that we must tolerate all but the intolerant, because if we tolerate the intolerant, the conditions for toleration disappear and the tolerant go with them. Can the right hon. Gentleman reach across the party divide to support the Government on that, because it is important for all of us?

[Angus Robertson]

There are things in politics about which there should be no disagreement between mainstream political parties. Very much in the spirit of what the right hon. Gentleman says, I would hope the proposals the Government bring forward can garner the maximum support. That is why, only a few short weeks ago, I raised with the Prime Minister the death of an Ahmadiyya Muslim in Glasgow. That is why I went to visit the Ahmadiyya Muslim community here in London—incidentally, the oldest mosque in London is an Ahmadiyya Muslim mosque—and why I am meeting the British Jewish community next week. This is not just about issues of intolerance towards or between different parts of the Islamic community; it impacts on the UK Jewish community. Sadly, there are a whole range of other forms of intolerance for which we should have no tolerance. I hope the Prime Minister and his colleagues bring forward something that can command support across the House. We will look as closely at that as possible. A Conservative Member asked a very difficult question earlier, one with which we would all grapple: at what point does the radicalisation process become so problematic that the law is tripped?

There is also a really big challenge for all of us in this age of modern technology. There are many examples—this is a matter of public record—of people becoming radicalised very, very quickly. We know our security services are having to grapple—as, unfortunately, security services in Belgium and France have had to recently—with the dangers of terrorist group operations. The difference between flash and bang—between the thought and the terrorist act—is extremely short. These are very difficult questions for all of us. I hope this is an area on which we can find cross-party agreement.

I would like to conclude, Mr Speaker, without reaching the 41-minute mark. Sadly, the Queen’s Speech is in many respects anaemic. It contains many pre-announced proposals for measures that have been carried over. There is a very strong focus on legislation for England and Wales. Of itself, that is not a bad thing—we wish our colleagues in England, Wales and the rest of the United Kingdom success—but it has crowded out alternatives, many of which have been proposed by the SNP.

Trident Renewal

Debate between Angus Robertson and Julian Lewis

Tuesday 20th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

rose—

[Angus Robertson]

On the basis of the hon. Gentleman’s long-standing and principled support for nuclear weapons, I would be pleased to take an intervention.

[Dr Lewis]

In return, I acknowledge the seriousness of the hon. Gentleman’s point about not finding anybody prepared to kill millions of people, but the logical conclusion of that standpoint is that we remain pacifists —[Interruption.] Let me explain. It would mean we could never declare war on any country, whatever the circumstances, because when we do, millions of people inevitably die. The question is, therefore: how do we prevent war? We do it by showing someone that they cannot attack us with these weapons without suffering similar retaliation.

[Angus Robertson]

I like the hon. Gentleman a great deal, but I note that even he, one of the leading supporters of nuclear weapons, could not give an example of circumstances where he would be prepared to see the killing of hundreds of millions of people.

The case is stronger than ever for embracing the non-replacement of Trident, which would offer serious strategic and economic benefits, as outlined in the June 2013 report “The Real Alternative”, including,

“improved national security—through budgetary flexibility in the Ministry of Defence and a more effective response to emerging security challenges in the 21st century”

and

“improved global security—through a strengthening of the non-proliferation regime, deterring of nuclear proliferation and de-escalation of international tensions”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Lewis]

Exactly. That leads us back to the heart of what the concept of deterrence requires in order to work. Deterrence means that a potential aggressor must not only face a degree of retaliation that is unacceptable if inflicted, but be convinced that that retaliation is unavoidable.

The key point about nuclear deterrence was made in a 1945 study by the leading defence scientist when nuclear weapons were first being considered as a concept. I love quoting the example—I have done so on previous occasions—given by Professor Sir Henry Tizard, who was one of the chief scientific advisers to the wartime Government, when he first considered what the atomic bomb would mean if it worked. He said that he could see no way of preventing an atomic bomb from being used except by the fear of retaliation, and he illustrated that by saying:

“A knowledge that we were prepared, in the last resort”—

our deterrent has always been the final resort, if the future existence of the nation is at stake—

“might well deter an aggressive nation. Duelling was a recognised method of settling quarrels between men of high social standing so long as the duellists stood twenty paces apart and fired at each other with pistols of a primitive type. If the rule had been that they should stand a yard apart with pistols at each other’s hearts, we doubt whether it would long have remained a recognised method of settling affairs of honour.”

The hon. Member for Moray referred to a number of things that I will touch on briefly. He talked about our obligations under article VI of the non-proliferation treaty, which states:

“Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.”

The only thing that is time-limited in that commitment is the cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date. We are not engaged in a nuclear arms race with anyone. We never have been and we have successively, as I said earlier, been reducing our capacity with little or no response from the other nuclear powers.

The other two, open-ended commitments are to achieve nuclear disarmament and to achieve general and complete disarmament. The article wisely recognises the link between the two, because one thing we do not wish to do by removing the balance of terror and by achieving even multilateral nuclear disarmament is to make the world safe again for conventional conflict between the major powers.

[Angus Robertson]

Will the hon. Gentleman update the House on the initiatives led by his Government to fulfil their obligations? He will forgive me, but I have not caught up with the discussions his Government have had with other nuclear powers to fulfil those obligations.

[Dr Lewis]

I do not think the hon. Gentleman has understood the three obligations I have listed. The first is to work for the cessation of the nuclear arms race—we are not a part of the nuclear arms race—at an early date. The second is to achieve world nuclear disarmament, and the third is to achieve general and complete conventional disarmament. I believe that those are, frankly, utopian visions that we work towards but which suffer setbacks according to the state of the world at any time, and the state of the world at the moment is one of grave disturbance and serious potential threats.

Devolution and the Union

Debate between Angus Robertson and Julian Lewis

Thursday 20th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Angus Robertson]

I am still only in my introductory remarks. It is also important on such an historic day to pay tribute to Alex Salmond on his leadership of the Scottish National party and his premiership as First Minister, both in minority and majority Governments, and for delivering free education in Scotland and the independence referendum.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I do indeed pay tribute to Alex Salmond who is a very considerable figure. By resigning, he seems to have recognised the outcome of the referendum. If the referendum had voted yes, that would have settled the issue for all time. Does the SNP accept that by voting no, it has settled the issue at least for a generation?

[Angus Robertson]

I was coming on to make the point that the Scottish National party and the Scottish Government continue to believe that Scotland should, and will in the future, be independent. However, we accept both the result of the referendum on 18 September and the fact that independence will not be the outcome of the Smith commission. What is beyond doubt is that the people of Scotland expect early and substantial change. I am not talking about something that is dependent on English votes for English laws—much as I have sympathy with that as an issue—the West Lothian question or the subsidy argument, from which many people in Scotland will recoil.

Royal Navy Ships

Debate between Angus Robertson and Julian Lewis

Tuesday 3rd December 2013 Westminster Hall

[Dr Lewis]

The distinction that I achieved cannot be overemphasised: I advanced from probationer ordinary seaman to full ordinary seaman. I was very proud to be one, because even in those days—it was from 1979 to 1982, or thereabouts—I was too old to be an officer cadet. I feel the bus pass jingling in my pocket.

Yesterday, I took the day off and had the great pleasure of travelling to Southampton university at the invitation of Commander Chris Ling, commanding officer of Thunderer Squadron, which is the defence technical undergraduate scheme at the university, and Lieutenant Amie Jackson. She—I emphasise “she”—is the commanding officer of the warship HMS Blazer, which is attached to the university’s Royal Navy unit. It was wonderful to celebrate with them the opening of their new joint headquarters at the National Oceanography Centre. Looking at the fine young people who are coming through the system and having a first-class maritime education there, I could not help wondering how many opportunities they would have, and how many naval vessels would be available for them to serve in, in the years ahead, when they go on, as so many of them do, to professional careers in the Royal Navy.

I said that I would talk a bit about strategy. I have always acknowledged on a cross-party basis that the concepts of Labour’s 1998 strategic defence review were very sound. They recognised that we were no longer facing as our primary concern the cold war threat on the continent, and that if our forces were engaged, it would be in more far-flung theatres. As we were no longer an empire and no longer had a string of bases all over the world, it would be necessary to have a portable, movable sea base that we could use to take our joint forces to the theatre in which they were engaged. That seemed sound then, and it is sound today. That concept required two sorts of taskforce: one to allow air power to be projected from the sea, hence the aircraft carriers; and the other to enable military power to be landed from the sea, hence the amphibious taskforce. Broadly speaking, we have the central elements of those taskforces.

We know that the aircraft carriers are moving steadily forward, whatever financial peaks and troughs they have had in their chequered history, and that they will come to fruition. I would like to predict that the Government will bring both carriers into service, because it would be sheer madness to build one of the largest ships that the Royal Navy has ever seen and not deploy it.

The Albion, the Bulwark, and our Bay-class ships of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary Service form the core of the amphibious taskforce, and again, it would be interesting to know—although I do not expect an answer today—what plans there are to think about the next generation of assault ships to follow the Albion and the Bulwark. However, the point about the two taskforces, and the relevance to today’s debate, is that they will have to be protected against air threats, surface threats and submarine threats. As I said before, if we need a certain number of frigates—let us say as many as four to protect a taskforce, if it were in a serious regional conflict—given the roles that the frigates will have to perform in other areas, including ongoing and standing tasks, I find myself querying how the idea that we will generate a minimum of seven available anti-submarine warfare frigates from only eight out of the 13 will work.

I shall say a brief word about numbers. I start from the standpoint that we are simply not spending enough on defence. I know all the economic arguments about that, but the fact is that as a proportion of gross domestic product, defence spending has declined too far down our list of priorities. Spending was between 4% and 5% during the cold war years. When Labour came into office in 1997, it went from 2.9% to 2.6%, then to 2.8%. Then, in successive years, it was 2.7%, 2.7% again, 2.5%, 2.5% again, and so on. That looked fairly consistent, but the problem was that during that period, we were engaged in fighting two large regional conflicts, and the Treasury was not prepared to stump up the extra money to fund those conflicts in full. As a result, we found the core military budget being eaten away by the financing of current conflicts, and since then, under the present Government, the situation has not improved. I believe that we are down to something like 2.1% of GDP at present, and I feel that that is the root of the problem.

At the time of the strategic defence review that set out those concepts, the Labour Government proposed reducing the combined number of frigates and destroyers from 35 to 32. The admirals gritted their teeth and accepted that, but it quickly emerged that 32 had actually gone down to 31, and the then Secretary of State, Geoff Hoon, formulated what I later dubbed the “Hoon excuse”, which was, “It doesn’t really matter that we have lost an extra frigate, because they are more powerful than they used to be, so 31 ships can do what 32 used to do.” That, I am afraid, was the start of a very slippery slope.

The next bite taken out of the total by the Labour Government took the number down from 31 to 25. I remember standing up in the House of Commons at the beginning of 2007 waxing eloquent about persistent rumours that the Government intended to mothball, if not permanently dispose of, another half a dozen frigates to take the total down to 19. In the end, that gradually slipped away, but a couple of Type 23 frigates were paid off, and effectively the total went down to 23 from 25. It took the Conservative-led coalition coming in before we went down to 19 in the 2010 SDSR, yet the concept set out in 1998 remained basically sound: we needed to be able to fulfil certain standing tasks, to protect a mobile base, and to escort an amphibious taskforce or an aircraft carrier taskforce. I do not see what doctrinal developments since then justify such a radical reduction in the numbers.

That leads to me to my final point, about the design concept, which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Bournemouth East mentioned. It is about whether it might be worth looking at the other five more general-purpose hulls that are proposed to bring the total number of frigates up to 13, and whether it might be worth considering doing something simpler to get more hulls in the water from which we can regenerate the surface fleet. Back in February 2005, in putting forward that concept, I was unwise enough to say that, really, the replacement general-purpose frigates ought to be “as cheap as chips”, which is not the sort of phrase that a proud Navy wants to hear. However, the point is based on an important development that I referred to in my opening questions—the idea of plug and play.

When the Type 45s were designed and put into service, they had a very large gymnasium. Why? Because they were designed in such a way that at a future stage in their life cycle, when we could afford it, we would be able to plug into that large space a module of land attack cruise missiles, which would hugely increase the ships’ power, even though we felt that we could not afford to do so at the beginning. It is perfectly possible to design ships that are relatively simple, but that have that capacity; I am extremely glad to see the hon. Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) nodding in agreement. We are very capable of upgrading those ships in their lifetime, and adding to their capacity. Perhaps it is too late now—I do not know—but we could at least try to keep the number of hulls a bit larger and lessen the complexity a bit; we would then have the basis for upgrading the quality of the vessels during their lifetime.

[Angus Robertson]

I suggest that the hon. Gentleman looks closely at the royal Danish navy’s StanFlex system, which does exactly that.

[Dr Lewis]

It is very much one of the examples that I have in mind. Those vessels are extremely economical, but they are out there in good numbers, and as was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage), who had to leave, they are exportable.

I think that the Chamber has heard more than enough from me on these matters. I very much look forward to hearing the wind-ups and, in particular, answers to some of the questions I posed. If I cannot have them all just now, perhaps I can have some of them in writing.