Prevention of Nuclear Proliferation

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Andrew Percy

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I rise to support the motion and the words of the Minister. Some of the shadow Minister’s comments about wanting to see an international extension were perfectly reasonable, but I do not think that that alone should have prevented us from acting on our own, and acting with the United States and Canada was entirely correct.

A great deal has been said that I do not wish to repeat, although I endorse what my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) said about comparisons between Israel’s having nuclear weapons and the acquisition of those weapons by the despotic regime in Iran. We are talking about two completely different Governments and to try to mix them up is unhelpful, to be polite about it.

I do not think that anybody who has spoken today has in the slightest attempted to denigrate or insult the history of Iran or the Iranian people. The issue that we all have is with the Iranian regime; the debate has been consensual in that we have all expressed our outrage at what that does to its own people. I do not think that those who urge us to go further are in any way seeking to denigrate the Iranian people or their history.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman is not trying to denigrate anybody, but unfortunately the history of interventions is that, however supportive people are or odious the regime is, we end up with an awful lot of wholly innocent civilians being killed, as happened in Afghanistan and Iraq. None of us wants to see that in Iran.

[Andrew Percy]

I do not think that anybody wants to see conflict in Iran; more importantly, none of us wants Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon at all. We are on the same page on that one.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

We have nuclear weapons here.

[Andrew Percy]

That is a different debate for a different day, but I would rather that nuclear weapons were in the hands of the United States or this country than in the Iranian regime’s, as it is currently constituted.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) commented on the International Atomic Energy Agency report—[Interruption.] I apologise for my croaky throat, Madam Deputy Speaker; it is difficult to get my words out. The hon. Gentleman’s conclusions were slightly different from those drawn by others. I want to remind him of a couple of things in that report. Crucially, the report found evidence that Iran has procured

“nuclear related and dual use equipment and materials by military related individuals and entities”;

has developed

“undeclared pathways for the production of nuclear material”;

has acquired

“nuclear weapons development information and documentation from a clandestine nuclear supply network”;

and has worked

“on the development of an indigenous design of a nuclear weapon including the testing of components”.

Further evidence is provided by the reports that we have seen about the high explosive test sites, the neutron initiator and the uranium enrichment, which all prove that Iran is closer than ever to a nuclear weapons programme.

There has also been the non-co-operation with the IAEA, of course—we know that inspectors are consistently barred from entering Iran. In some cases they have been expelled; in 2007, 38 inspectors were expelled. We can read a great deal into the response of the Iranian regime to the IAEA findings; it simply dismisses them as having been written by people acting on behalf of the United States or its western allies.

I do not think that the report’s conclusions were quite as the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington suggested. We should be extremely concerned. It is absolutely right that we act as we have been acting and show leadership on the issue. Yes, we would like other European countries to come on board, but acting as we have, along with the United States and Canada, is right for this country and what we are all trying to achieve—Iran never getting hold of a nuclear weapon. I associate myself with many of the comments made in this debate and I endorse the position of the Government.