(1 year, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberI am just looking up page 89, which says that, to counter these threats,
“we will step up our efforts to deliver an Integrated Air and Missile Defence approach.”
We are doing that across NATO, integrated with NATO, and working with the Germans and the French. We are already starting that. We have signed up to the process. [Interruption.] We are starting it now. Last month, we started to examine what Europe and NATO need to have the right integrated air defence to protect its territory. The starting point is to find out what we need. There is no point in us rushing out and buying long-range air defence missiles if the long range can be done from a ship in the channel. There is no point rushing out and buying very short range if we are not deploying from our bases in Tidworth.
So, first, we have already started doing the overall survey of what needs to be done. Secondly, we have started investing in our next generation of GBAD—ground-based air defence—our medium-range air defence capability. And we have recognised that we are short of our long-range air defence capability by investing—[Interruption.] We are already doing it. I do not know where the hon. Gentleman has been for the past two years. If he actually paid attention to this, he would realise that we have started investing in the extended-range missile for the Type 45; we have started increasing the number of batteries of our GBAD; and we have managed to export our GBAD to Poland in a £2 billion export deal. So we have started this, but the first thing to do is recognise that we put together the right profile of air defence because, as he will know, it is layered, so we have to get the right layers. If we do not get the right layers, we look like some of those countries such as Russia, which just buy big profile things that cannot talk to each other and then they get whacked.
May I begin by thanking my right hon. Friend for his service and leadership? Does anything in this Command Paper address the barriers and bureaucracy that are hindering Ukrainian defence manufacturers and British defence manufacturers from collaborating effectively together? Such collaboration would help the Ukrainians to liberate their country and enhance our own capability and supply chain.
There is certainly an odd thing that I observe in the Department: I cannot understand why the procurement speed and delivery in our Kindred, our operation to gift and support Ukraine, cannot be normal for us. I see our procurement in parallel. Some of that is about assurances. If we are going to fly drones over people in this country, we require much higher levels of assurances; the Civil Aviation Authority and so on absolutely require that. When you are in war, some of those levels can drop. Some of it is simply about that, but in other areas it is one lesson we are looking at through Defence Equipment and Support to understand how we can bring that into our main procurement and delivery.
(1 year, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberFirst, I am not sure where the hon. Gentleman gets that we will not get the 3% to avoid the cuts. At the moment, it will be a decision on the balance of investments. He will see in the Command Paper how we apportion any savings that we have to make as a result of inflation, but overall, as I have said, our equipment programme and, indeed, our envelope are on track, subject to inflation pressures and extra operational commitments that we have made. He will also be aware that we have had an extra £560 million on top of that for restocking ammunition, and we have also had commitments from the Treasury on new for old and much of the gifting. I believe that the Army will be in a good state throughout this process, and I will make sure that when it comes to the Defence Command Paper, he gets a full read-out of why and how we make those decisions.
(1 year, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberFirst, we expect General Dynamics to stick within the terms of its contract, and we will stick to our side of the contract. The user validation trials, which are the first steps in getting this Ajax programme back on track, have now been completed. We are looking at the results and hope to start the next phase soon, which is good news all round.
What plans does my right hon. Friend have to further invest in and enhance our sovereign defence manufacturing capability, which not only provides us with a massive strategic benefit but is great for jobs and apprenticeships?
When we published the defence Command Paper, we committed to invest £23 billion in our land capabilities over the next 10 years—a significant investment in land. That was accompanied by a land industrial strategy. It has also been accompanied by a defence and security industrial strategy that puts a lot of weight on ensuring that we support a sovereign supply chain where possible, and that we invest in skills. A number of working groups in Government are designed to do just that, and to both improve the skills base, but also to ensure that, where possible, we get the best social value and indeed a British supply chain.
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
I am looking at that, both in case management—some case management should already be being used—and in mailing provision. If we do a mass mail, how can we improve that—Mailchimp or that type of thing.
Our nation owes a huge debt of gratitude and honour to the people who helped our forces when they were deployed for 20 years in Afghanistan. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that the offer to relocate and assist in bringing them back is open-ended, and we will do whatever we can, even if it takes years to do it, to open up and offer that assistance and help?
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberWe published a consultation on a number of proposals for the visa system around Commonwealth soldiers. We will be publishing a response very soon and the hon. Gentleman will get the answers he requires.
My hon. Friend has already referred to the great economic benefits resulting from the £400 million investment in enhancing C-17 Chinook capability, but does he agree that it will also help us to ensure that we can continue to undertake complex operations like the recent withdrawal from Afghanistan, where C-17 transport aircraft played a key role?
(3 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberWe are not going to spend billions increasing the number of nuclear weapons. In 2016, the House voted collectively for a nuclear deterrent—I am sure the hon. Member did not, and certainly the leader he used to follow did not either. That is what it believes, and I think the number of people who do not believe it are probably joining the hon. Member in the room where he asked the question.
I congratulate and thank my right hon. Friend for his statement. The review specifically refers to a more productive integration of the reserve forces. Will he give a bit more detail on that and confirm that the reserves have to remain a vital part of our whole force structure?
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that they are really important; they are more important than they have ever been. Looking across the three services, some services embrace them well and some could do a lot more. I have already started the process of trying to remove barriers—for example, by ensuring that the attitude in the Department to using reserves is not as a last resort, but as an integral part of what we wish to do. RF30 will report soon. No doubt, my hon. Friend will interested in the results. In response to covid, there has been seamlessness between reserves and regulars across the services. We need to embrace that even more to ensure that the men and women who want to contribute to this country’s defence—no matter who they are—can do so and can bring those skills to bear.
(4 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberI will do my best to answer all the questions. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his support of the counter-Daesh actions.
The right hon. Gentleman asks whether the number of strikes has increased. I can write to him with the details of the total global coalition strikes, but I can say that United Kingdom strikes have increased in the past few months, although that is mainly a reflection of the functioning Government of Iraq and a better outcome that they are requiring and requesting in support. He might remember that the previous Government were in a state of paralysis and then on a number of occasions not functioning. The increase in strikes is mainly a reflection of what we have seen since then, but I am happy to write to him and clarify more the overall coalition responses.
On NATO and training, NATO has sought to see where it can step in and support specifically in the areas of training, security improvements, nation building and so on. It has not progressed as fast as needed, because of covid and the quietness at the beginning of the year, from both the threat and everything else. Also, many of the traditional partners we work with feel that their training has been completed. Therefore, we are working with NATO and the Iraqis to see where else we can assist. We stand ready to do more, and we are exploring more.
At the same time, in answer to the question whether more NATO means less US, the outcome of the US security dialogue will, I think, be the next stage where we will be able to understand what more we can do. We all recognise that the previous Iraqi Parliament passed a non-binding resolution asking the United States forces to leave. That only becomes binding if the Iraqi Government act on it. The new Iraqi Government have said they continue to require coalition support, and that is why the security dialogue is ongoing at the moment.
The right hon. Gentleman also asks about the dispersal of Daesh into other safe spaces. It is absolutely the case, as he rightly points out, that safe spaces have been identified by Daesh, such as the Chad basin in west Africa, and indeed we see Daesh active in Afghanistan and Somalia. There is definitely a terrorist threat in west Africa—not all Daesh, but certainly an extremist, radical, militant, Salafi-type threat. That is why the French mission in Mali is supported by a squadron of our Chinook helicopters. At the end of this year, 250 British soldiers will deploy as part of the UN multidimensional integrated stabilisation mission in Mali—MINUSMA—to improve the security situation in that part of the country. For us, it is not only about helping our allies, the French and other European nations there, but about ensuring that the knock-on effect of a destabilised west Africa does not end up on the shores of the Mediterranean and cause another immigration crisis, as we have seen in the past, and that is something we are working towards.
On the repatriation of child refugees, as the right hon. Gentleman will know, we took the path of identifying the most vulnerable in refugee camps—either surrounding Syria or where they were—and bringing them back and repatriating them to this country to give them the support they need. It is my understanding that we have done that for over 20,000 of them. As for his comments about Syrian children in Europe, I will have to get back to him about that. However, the Government have made our position clear that we felt the best way to help in that situation was to take refugees from in-theatre, and other European countries should stand by their obligations towards refugees and asylum seekers. In addition, the Foreign Secretary has made it very clear that if children are identified in Syria, for example, who are vulnerable or orphaned and so on, we will explore in every case, on a case-by-case basis, what we can do to help those children as well—whether by bringing them back to this country or making sure they get the help they need.
I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement to the House. The Kurdish peshmerga and the Iraqi army united with the global coalition to help destroy the brutal Daesh caliphate, but Daesh is now regrouping in territories disputed between the Kurds and the Iraqis. Does my right hon. Friend agree that this underlines the vital importance of our actively helping Baghdad and Irbil resolve their differences in military and political matters?
It is vital, for all the people of Iraq and Syria, that we get as much stability as possible. It is incredibly important that we work with the Kurds and the Iraqis to ensure that, where there are differences, they are sorted out or negotiated. Indeed, we should work with both Turkey and Kurdish forces to make sure that they both accommodate each other and that they understand there is often a common need for them to work together, or certainly that it is in their common interest to defeat Daesh and al-Qaeda.