Defending the UK and Allies

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Monday 15th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Our Royal Navy is one of the top five in the world. It is capable of operating in all the world’s oceans simultaneously and we are one of only two countries to operate fifth-generation jets from the sea, so we should be confident and proud of our Royal Navy. As I have said, we are investing in more equipment and capability going into the future. The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight some of the recruitment challenges—the Defence Secretary highlighted some of them the other week—but we are doubling down on all our initiatives to ensure that our armed forces have the staff they need for the future, and that those personnel have the equipment and supplies they need to do their jobs effectively.

[Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I fully support my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. I welcome both his statement about the action he took on the Houthi and the other part of the statement about Ukraine, because we must support Ukraine and its future.

On the reality of the Houthi, we know that Iran has supported, has supplied and continues to direct the Houthi in their attacks; it supported and directed Hamas in their brutal attacks in October; and it has armed and directs Hezbollah on a regular basis and tells them what to do, through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. We understand all that, so why are we still reluctant to proscribe the IRGC, which is responsible for so much of the co-ordination of that work? There are still two Iranian banks in the City of London feeding money to those terrible organisations.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the work he personally does in supporting Ukraine. I agree with him about the risks that Iran poses to the UK and to regional stability. We have sanctioned more than 400 Iranian individuals and entities, including the IRGC in its entirety. The National Security Act 2023 implements new measures to protect the British public—it has been described by intelligence chiefs as “game changing”—particularly in tackling espionage and foreign interference, with tougher powers to arrest and detain people suspected of involvement in state threats.

As my right hon. Friend will know, we do not routinely comment on proscription, but I hope he will have seen the statement today about our proscription of Hizb ut-Tahrir, on which I know he and colleagues have rightly been focused in previous years.