NATO Summit

James Heappey Excerpts

Monday 16th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, that comment was not actually made at the NATO summit. Secondly, the hon. Lady might have seen that we have not sued the European Union; what we are doing is going into negotiations.

[James Heappey (Wells) (Con)]

The Prime Minister has spoken about the impressive advances in cyber-capability being made across the alliance. How is thinking developing over how the principles of collective security enshrined in article 5 would be applied in the event of a cyber-attack, because I know that work on that has been ongoing within NATO for some time?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise this issue. It is fair to say that we have been pressing for reform of NATO for some time, as has the United States, recognising these issues. NATO does recognise the issue and it is still working on that question. It is important that we have made our offensive cyber-capabilities available to the alliance. One or two other countries are now doing that as well, and I look forward to seeing others do the same.