Hugh Bayley
Main Page: Hugh Bayley (Labour - York Central)Department Debates - View all Hugh Bayley's debates with the Cabinet Office
(10 years, 4 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we need to give the issue further attention. At the G8 last year, we talked about encouraging leading countries such as France, Germany, Italy and Britain to partner up with nations and their security forces to try to strengthen their work in combating extremism. That is more urgent than ever, and there is a real opportunity at the NATO summit to put more flesh on the bones of that idea. As we do so, and as President Obama said in his West Point speech, we should not think that the only answer is a security and military one; we should be thinking about aid, development, advice and all the other things we can do to help the country.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
Like the Prime Minister, I had the great privilege to be invited to attend the D-day celebrations in Normandy. It made me reflect on the dangers of sitting on our hands when another country is re-arming and acting aggressively. In the past five years, Russia has increased its defence spending by more than 10% a year in real terms, while defence expenditure has been reduced in Europe by an average of 10% over the same period. The UK has cut its defence spending by 18% in real terms. Does the Prime Minister think that now is the time to reconsider those cuts, stop them and start rebuilding our defence forces?
The Prime Minister
On the figures, this Government effectively froze defence spending in cash terms, which was an 8% real-terms cut. We are, of course, still meeting the 2% that NATO countries are meant to meet, and we are virtually the only country in Europe that is doing so, so I think we are in a strong position to say to others that they should do more.
Where I would perhaps part company with the hon. Gentleman is on the fact that our changes are about making sure that we have effective and deployable armed forces. Some countries might maintain spending or current patterns, but they do not actually have deployable armed forces for the things that are needed. That is what we need to get countries to focus on as they come to the NATO summit.