Trident Renewal

Eilidh Whiteford Excerpts

Tuesday 20th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dame Joan Ruddock]

As I go on in my speech, I hope to indicate that I am talking about today and tomorrow.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

The right hon. Lady is making an important speech about the way we think about these issues. Does she agree that the threats emerging in the world at a geopolitical level relate to terrorism? Does she agree that a nuclear bomb is no use at all against terrorists?

[Dame Joan Ruddock]

I agree with the hon. Lady, but, interestingly, the Government do not, and I will address that point, too.

So what do the true believers say Trident renewal is for? Three threat scenarios are usually advanced: the re-emergence of a major nuclear threat, which is code for Russia; new states acquiring nuclear capability, which is code for Iran; and state-sponsored nuclear terrorism. Russia is behaving badly, it is modernising its nuclear arsenals and it is threatening Ukraine, but why would Russia specifically target Britain for a nuclear attack? We have to ask the same question of Iran, surrounded as it is by nuclear-armed Pakistan on one side and nuclear-armed Israel on the other: what would be the motivation for an attack on the UK? Is it not clear that, however unpalatable, painstaking diplomatic negotiation with this regime aimed at preventing its acquisition of nuclear weapons is more likely to succeed than military threats?