Diego Garcia Military Base and British Indian Ocean Territory Bill

Graham Stringer Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 9th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

I have a lot of time for the hon. Gentleman, but I am afraid he is incorrect about the notification criteria. There is a lot of fake news out there—which I and the Minister beside me, my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth, have corrected in this House before—about the suggestion that pre-notification of action is required; it is not. As is explicitly set out in the documents, we do not need to undertake pre-notification. It is established under the criteria that post-action notification for overseas bases is normal, and that would be normal for the UK and our overseas allies that have overseas bases. It is not unusual, and he will be familiar with the fact that there is further international reporting of any military action. It is important that we go on the facts. Some people are worried about the situation that the hon. Gentleman outlined, but I can reassure him that they do not need to worry about it, because what he said is not accurate.

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Middleton South) (Lab)]

I sincerely congratulate my hon. Friend on his new position. I have to say to him that I have never found it a satisfactory basis for arguments or positions in this Chamber to say that those on the other side are doing it. However, I do think it is important that we are consistent. When we were in opposition and the Conservatives were in government, they made the Foreign Secretary a Member of the House of Lords, and we created about it. We shouted about how someone in a senior Cabinet position should be directly accountable to this House. We now have a super-active Attorney General making many controversial decisions. Does my hon. Friend agree with me that we should be making the case that the Attorney General should be in this House, not the other place?

[Luke Pollard]

That is not a matter for me in relation to this Bill, but my hon. Friend has put his views on the record, and I am certain that others on the Front Bench will have heard what he has said.

Defence Procurement: Small and Medium-sized Enterprises

Graham Stringer Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for bringing this topic forward. He is absolutely right to recognise the importance of SMEs and what they can do. In Northern Ireland, Thales invented and produced the NLAW— the next-generation light anti-tank weapon—which slowed down the Russian advance; Thales is also at the forefront of cybersecurity, and all those things are very important. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, when it comes to supporting all SMEs across the United Kingdom—those 434,000 jobs—Northern Ireland must be an integral part of that? I know that is what the hon. Gentleman and the Minister think, and it really is the way forward.

[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

Order. This debate is for an hour and is well-subscribed, so I ask hon. Members to be brief in their interventions.

[Alan Strickland]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. He is absolutely right that the commitment of Ministers and the defence industrial strategy to sovereign supply must include all parts of our United Kingdom, including the excellent capabilities in Northern Ireland.

Being war-ready for conflicts we cannot predict that will use technology that has not yet been invented, means giving our military the agility and capability to adapt to this changing landscape. Changing the way in which we think about defence procurement is central to this. My second point is around adopting a proactive, entrepreneurial approach to acquiring the defence supplies we need.

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[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to speak in the debate. We will start with a three-minute time limit on speeches.

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[Fred Thomas]

The hon. Member is absolutely correct. It is not quite in my constituency—it is in the neighbouring constituency, Plymouth Sutton and Devonport—but I agree.

In terms of SMEs, primes can also offer a service to the Government and the Ministry of Defence. If we had a massive change in system, which would be extremely hard to execute, and the MOD was suddenly able to procure directly from SMEs across the country, we would have an enormous challenge of integrating the different capabilities into a usable platform. Half of the things would not be able to talk to each other; they would be made to do their one task and we would then try to put on top of them a second radar system or some piece of satellite that could speak down to whatever comms link we were using. That is enormously expensive. However, primes can do that integration. They can go to the Government and say, “You have a demand signal to do something,” rather than to have a particular capability—to monitor the North sea, for example—and then go out to the SMEs in different constituencies that hon. Members have highlighted so fantastically, gather various bits of capability and knit that into one big package to sell to the Government. That would feel more expensive and slower to the Government, but it could be cheaper in the long term, in some instances.

That said, I and colleagues are overwhelmed almost daily by individuals in the UK defence industry reaching out on LinkedIn or by email, begging the Government to listen to what they are offering. They are patriotic people who think they can save us money and give us strategic advantage by delivering a piece of capability, when we currently spend obscene amounts of money on something that sometimes does not work well or produce the desired effect. I would love the Minister to give us a sense of what the Government are going to do differently from previous Governments to actively offer a forum for those SMEs to pitch their capabilities. I am immensely proud of the Secretary of State and the Minister who joins us today for their work so far—

[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

Order.

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[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

We have gained a few minutes. I ask the Minister to leave a couple of minutes at the end for the proposer of the debate to wind up.

Oral Answers to Questions

Graham Stringer Excerpts

Monday 18th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Middleton South) (Lab)]

Deciding to defer or to review is just as much of a decision as one to go ahead or not to go ahead, because it means that nothing is happening. The Typhoon factory at Warton is currently idle—no Typhoons are being produced—which is bad for exports and bad for our defence. Can the Secretary of State tell the House when we will take a decision to procure more Typhoons? There are 25,000 jobs at risk, as well as the country’s defence.

[John Healey]

I have had the privilege of visiting Warton, and I have seen the skills, the technology and the workforce’s commitment and dedication to that job. The reviewers of the strategic defence review will produce their final report and make recommendations in the spring. In the meantime, my hon. Friend rightly points to exports. It may interest him to know that, last week, I was in Turkey and Saudi Arabia to discuss with Defence Ministers the future role that UK-made Typhoons could play in the defence of both countries.