British Armed Forces: Global Britain

Baroness Smith of Newnham Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I pay tribute to our Armed Forces’ regulars and reserves for the work they do internationally and at home: dealing with Covid, the floods and now trying to play a key role in global Britain. The noble Lord, Lord Lancaster, urged the Minister to say that the Government would keep up the major humanitarian efforts, but he also noted that the problem is that the UK is seen as here today and gone tomorrow, or here one minute and gone the next. That reflects the danger of Prime Ministers—David Cameron did this quite often—and others going somewhere and making a commitment without necessarily a clear strategic objective. Could the Minister clarify what the strategy behind global Britain will be and reassure us that it will not cause overstretch, further damaging our Armed Forces’ morale?