Integrated Review Debate

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Department: Cabinet Office

Integrated Review

Emma Lewell-Buck Excerpts
Tuesday 16th March 2021

(3 years, 8 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lindsay Hoyle Portrait Mr Speaker
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We will certainly take Lancashire, even if the Prime Minister cannot say whereabouts.

Emma Lewell-Buck Portrait Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab) [V]
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The review and the Prime Minister’s statement are typically big on words, but scant on detail or strategy. It was a mass of contradictions steeped in a lack of realism when it comes to affordability and scope, and there was zero acknowledgement of the harm that years of underinvestment in our nation’s defence have caused. Ultimately, the world will judge him and his Government on their actions, so can he explain how breaching article 6 of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty fits with his commitment to international law?

Boris Johnson Portrait The Prime Minister
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I never saw such a seething mass of contradictions as the Opposition Front Bench, because we only have to go a few yards from the Leader of the Opposition to the shadow Foreign Secretary to find a complete gulf in their view on the very matter that the hon. Lady raises. The Leader of the Opposition claims to be in favour of the nuclear deterrent, and the shadow Foreign Secretary voted against it. The most consistent thing that our friends and allies, as well as our foes around the world need to know is that the UK is committed to the defence of this country and to our nuclear defence.