Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[John Healey]

We are accelerating recruitment. We are dealing with the deep-seated and long-running failure in recruitment, because the previous Government, over 14 years, set and then failed to meet their own recruitment targets. We are dealing with the recruitment and retention crisis in the armed forces. I am proud to say that last year we gave the armed forces the biggest pay rise for over 20 years; that this year there will be another inflation-busting pay rise; and that we are starting to provide better pay, better kit, better housing and better support for forces families—the sorts of things that will keep those valuable and valued members of the armed forces serving our country and protecting us all.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

11. What estimate he has made of the cost to his Department of the UK-Mauritius agreement concerning the Chagos archipelago, including Diego Garcia.

[The Minister for the Armed Forces (Luke Pollard)]

As the Defence Secretary has said, the cost of the agreement represents less than 0.2% of the annual MOD budget. This has secured unrestricted access to and use of the base on Diego Garcia, control over movement of all persons and good on the base, and control of all communications and electronic systems. It is a good deal.

[Greg Smith]

I do not know that I agree with the Minister that this is a good deal, although I am curious about the £30 billion. Does it count towards the new NATO target of 3.5%, or the additional 1.5% on top of that? As we have to inform the Mauritian Government before we do anything particularly useful from that base, should that cost actually be counted in the defence numbers at all?

[Luke Pollard]

Let me squash the hon. Gentleman’s last comment, which is wrong: we do not have to inform Mauritius before taking any military action. Under the treaty, we have to provide notification after the event. I have explained this 13 times in written answers to Members on the Conservative Front Bench, but I am afraid that they still do not get it. That underlines why they could not do a deal after 11 rounds of negotiation, whereas this Government did it after two rounds, securing the future of that vital base for UK and US operations.