Strategic Defence and Security Review

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I know the hon. Lady has a very strong constituency interest in this matter, and perhaps I can get back to her in greater detail on the refit programme. I can tell her that HMS Ocean will be going into refit. Clearly, as we have explained, the number of frigates and destroyers combined will be coming down to 19. The decision on the future of HMS Ocean and HMS Illustrious will have to be taken on the basis of what is the best platform for the use of helicopters. The best thing is for us, as we go through the details, to tell her more about what I think will be fundamentally good news for both Plymouth and Portsmouth, because we want to keep both naval bases—and keep them busy. The communities there are hugely supportive of our armed forces and give them tremendous backing. I have never believed that it is right to put all our defence eggs into a very small number of bases, as it were, so Portsmouth, Plymouth and Faslane will of course all go ahead.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I commend my right hon. Friend’s determination to adopt a more thoughtful and strategic approach. Has he had a chance to read the Public Administration Committee’s report “Who does UK National Strategy?”, in which the outgoing Chief of the Defence Staff commented that the UK had

“lost an institutionalised capacity for, and culture of, strategic thought”?

Does my right hon. Friend agree that we need a more co-ordinated approach to strategic thinking across Whitehall, and will he adopt the report’s recommendations?

[The Prime Minister]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. That was one of the reasons why yesterday we published the national security strategy separately—so that people could see that the defence review flows from strategic thinking about Britain’s place in the world, about the threats we face and about how we can bring all of the Government together to try to deal with that. The National Security Council and the national security adviser, Peter Ricketts—I pay tribute to him and his team for their work—are working well at bringing the Government together to interrogate the experts and really think about what our strategy should be and what that means for the decisions we have to take. That is much better than a two-way battle between the Ministry of Defence and the Treasury.