Defence

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Wednesday 2nd July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

The right hon. Gentleman will know, because I have had a similar conversation in a variety of different formats over recent weeks, that the policy intention of the Northern Ireland Office is to repeal and, importantly, replace the unlawful Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023. It has been found to be unlawful, it does not enjoy community support and it needs to be repealed and replaced. Any Government who were elected last July would have had to do that.

[Sir Julian Lewis]

On the point about not enjoying community support, when we were having these debates in great detail, the highly divided communities would always stand up and say how this was unacceptable and that was unacceptable, and then their representatives would quietly come up to us and say, “For goodness’ sake, go on doing what you are doing.” The Minister may have some legal problems to overcome, but let him not be fooled by what is said in public about what really needs to be done.

[Luke Pollard]

I thank the right hon. Member for his contribution. Indeed, it is a matter that my colleagues in the Northern Ireland Office follow closely as that is the lead Department with responsibility for the repealing and replacing of the legacy Act. I am certain that he will continue making suggestions in that way. It is not for me to make announcements on the Northern Ireland Office’s behalf, but I am certain that it will have listened to what he had to say.

I am grateful for the remarks from the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Ben Obese-Jecty). I told him just before this that I look forward to seeing him on the Front Bench in a shadow Defence role very soon. As he knows, I am a big fan of what he has to say, and I like the way he brings his military expertise and a certain defence nerdery, which, as a defence nerd on the Labour side, I very much appreciate.

I politely say to the hon. Member that my experience from engaging with our allies on NATO’s eastern flank—from Finland and the Baltic states all the way down, passing Belarus and others, is that the nations there value the relationship with the United Kingdom even more so over the past year. We have strong relations with the Joint Expeditionary Force nations of northern Europe, and we continue to deepen relations with our Baltic friends, including enhancing our forward land force in Estonia, and our co-operation and support for Latvia and Lithuania. I do not recognise that concern, but he is right to raise it, if only to allow me to put on the record that we have strong support from those nations and, indeed, we strongly support them in wanting to be sovereign and free, including from Russian aggression.

I also politely say to the hon. Member that RRS Sir David Attenborough provides an important presence in the Antarctic region. If he has not yet discovered polar region nerdery, can I recommend that to him? Not only do HMS Protector—our ice ship—and RRS Sir David Attenborough provide an important presence for our Arctic and Antarctic missions; they also help us honour our obligations under the Antarctic treaty, which is an important part of the rules-based framework for the protection of the Antarctic.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

Counter-terrorism police are still investigating the incident at RAF Brize Norton, and it is right that we allow them the space to complete that investigation. The wider review looks at security at not just RAF Brize Norton, but all defence sites. We are looking with colleagues across Government at what investment is needed, and at how we can work with others to secure the safety of sites to ensure that the UK maintains operational security for all its assets.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Almost by definition, RAF sites have to have very long perimeter fences, so it is understandable that they could be overcome at one point or another. Why were they apparently not fitted with sensors, at least, so that any intrusion would have sounded the alarm?

[Luke Pollard]

I do not want to pre-empt the findings of all the reviews, but the right hon. Gentleman is right that our air bases tend to cover a large area. The perimeter fences we inherited on many of our air bases were not designed to keep everyone out with large things, but to be a perimeter defence. In the ongoing security work, we are looking at how technological solutions and changes in guarding might contribute to enhanced security, given the increased threat that we face.

UK Military Base Protection

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 23rd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. I am afraid that a Government Minister’s usual line about proscription is that we do not comment on it except when, as today, I have been able to confirm that a group has been proscribed following the Home Secretary’s decision. I encourage my hon. Friend to have a conversation with the Security Minister, who is sitting next to me.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I must say that I am very surprised that the Home Secretary chose to put out a written statement, rather than making an oral statement, when we could have put to her some of these points about what exactly qualifies a group to be proscribed as a terrorist organisation.

I entirely agree with the sentiment in the House that Palestine Action sabotaged these planes, caused criminal damage and could be liable to a charge of criminal conspiracy, and that the people who did the damage should be pursued for remuneration to the point of bankruptcy. However, it would do the country and the Government no favours if they were to lose in court a challenge to the process of proscription, because whereas the secret sabotage of planes would certainly have been an act of terrorism leading to proscription, the fact is that this was a performative act that these people announced they had done. My advice to the Government is to make sure, when these people are prosecuted, that it is not solely on the grounds of committing terrorist acts, rather than committing treasonous acts of sabotage.

[Luke Pollard]

I reassure the right hon. Gentleman that there will be a full debate in this House in the coming days as part of the proscription process, so in due course he and all Members will have an opportunity to debate in full the proscription decision the Home Secretary has taken. I can tell him that the decision to proscribe has not been made without considerable thought, or without reflecting on the information in the public domain and information that perhaps is not, and that it was underpinned by a very serious legal process. I would agree with his concern, but I seek to reassure him that those matters have been considered as part of the process.

Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Thursday 5th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

First, I put on record that we have exceptional civil servants working in this area who take the decisions very seriously and make those decisions in full consciousness of their consequences. I am absolutely convinced that we have a good team working on this.

On the point the hon. Member raises, we are making decisions against the published criteria, and it is right to do so. We know that amendments to the published criteria change the eligibility in respect of past cases. We also know that at the moment we have the most generous Afghan resettlement scheme. We have resettled 34,000 eligible persons in the United Kingdom under ARAP and the associated Afghan resettlement schemes, which is more than many of our allies. It is right that we make those decisions against the published criteria, and that we look carefully at them. That is why I undertook to do so in this case, and I have done so.

There is a real challenge, and I entirely understand it. As someone who has advocated for Afghans in my own Plymouth constituency who fell outside the published criteria, which were set in place by the last Government and that we have followed, I have often argued that we should look again at this obligation. I am entirely aware that the majority of my efforts on this have centred on the Triples, who I will come on to, and whether those decisions were made correctly. I will give the House an update on that in a moment.

I want to make sure that decisions are correct according to the published criteria. Those criteria are frequently challenged in the courts, and we have to uphold them to make sure that every decision is valid. Every case is assessed on a case-by-case basis, based on the information provided following a request for the information held not just by the Ministry of Defence but by other Government Departments and partners across Government, in order to make sure that the decision taken is as appropriate as possible. Individuals who get a decision that is not in their favour also have the ability to provide additional evidence and to have that decision reviewed.

[Sir Julian Lewis]

I know that the Minister sincerely cares about all of this, and I am sure that he really wants to do his best, however the key point being made by my hon. and right hon. and gallant Friends is that, if the criteria do not cater for a situation in which senior British military personnel give first-person testimony that somebody saved British lives by taking exceptionally courageous steps in our support, the criteria need to be adjusted. That is what should be done, as I hope he is going tell us that it may have been adjusted for the Triples.

[Luke Pollard]

I entirely understand where the right hon. Gentleman is going with that argument. Under the criteria in the scheme we inherited from the previous Government, which we have continued, we have made the decision, with the exception of the Triples, to keep the eligibility decisions the same.

Let me turn to the Triples, which the right hon. Gentleman raised. I believe that the quote of the Secretary of State when in opposition was in relation to the very concerning situation—I believe it was a concern to him and to me when in opposition—that decisions were made in respect of the Afghan special forces, the Triples, that were inconsistent with the evidence that was being provided. We backed and called for the Triples review, which was initiated by my predecessor in the previous Government. Phase 1 of that review has now completed and we have achieved an overturn rate of around 30%. A written ministerial statement on that was published— I think last month—should the right hon. Gentleman want to refer to the full details.

In that work, we interrogated the data that was available. The record-keeping of that period was not good enough, as I have said from the Dispatch Box a number of times since taking office. As part of that trawl, we discovered information in relation to top-up payments, which previously had been excluded from the criteria because they did not constitute the relationship with the UK Government that would have created eligibility. Our belief is that the way those top-up payments were applied may now constitute a relationship that needs to be re-examined, so phase 2 of the Triples review, which will be the final phase of the review, is looking at top-up payments. It was right to do that, because there was a clear point.

In the case raised by the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green, I am very happy to try to see what is available to support it. I feel very deeply that we need to honour our obligations to those people who served alongside our forces, from the Afghan translators and interpreters who live in the constituency I represent, to the people who fought, and in some cases died, alongside our forces. The ARAP scheme is a generous scheme, but it was not intended, at its point of initiation or now, to cover all Afghans who fought in that conflict over 20 years. It was designed to support those who we can evidence had a close connection to UK forces, often defined by a contractual or payment relationship—in blunt plain-English terms—where a sizeable commitment has been made. That draws a line for some individuals who were employed by the Afghan national army, the Afghan Government and elements of the security structures that the Afghan Government had at that time, for which eligibility is not created despite their role. The Taliban regime has created chaos, instability and terror through many communities in Afghanistan since our departure. That is why, as a Government, we are trying to accelerate and deliver the Afghan scheme.

The hon. Member for North East Fife mentioned communications. That is entirely right. It is something I have been raising since becoming a Minister. We will introduce, from the autumn, a new series of communications designed to help people understand where their application is in the process. The new performance indicators will kick in from September time—roughly in the autumn—and that will seek to help people to understand where they are in the process. There is concern around understanding for how long a case will be dealt with. I also hope the performance indicators will have time-bound targets to help people be able to rate the performance of the Ministry of Defence. Certainly, when the Defence Secretary published his statement on the Afghan resettlement scheme at the end of last year, he made the case that we need to complete our obligation and bring the schemes to a close, and it is our objective to do so.

Armed Forces Commissioner Bill

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 3rd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

It has often been said that the courts rejected the legacy Act, at least in part. I am not aware of which part specifically they rejected, but I would like to remind the ministerial team that in 2017 the then Defence Committee examined in great detail whether it would be legal to have a statute of limitation that would put an end to these prosecutions. Four professors of law, including Philippe Sands, agreed that it would be, as long as there was an investigative process, possibly embodied in a truth recovery process. When the Government bring forward whatever alternative legislation to the legacy Act they propose, will they make sure that a statute of limitation is part of it?

[Luke Pollard]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman. He and I have had many long discussions about issues that the Committee discussed when he chaired it, and I am aware that my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) may have interest in this as Chair of the Committee today. I will ensure that my colleagues in the Northern Ireland Office who are leading on that work have heard those remarks.

UK Nuclear Deterrent

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 2nd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

A fundamental part of the conversations about the strategic defence review that Lord Robertson and the review team have been having since the Labour Government came to power is how we reinforce the concept of deterrence, and why the concept of deterrence is so important to our security. Our armed forces—some of the best in the world—have capabilities that should deter any aggression, and we will be further enhancing that through the measures set out in the strategic defence review, as the Defence Secretary will announce shortly. We want to deter aggression but, if necessary, we need to have the capabilities to defeat it, and that is what the strategic defence review, which will be announced shortly, will detail to the House.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

As it was this issue that brought me into politics many decades ago, it is an absolute pleasure to hear the full-throated commitment of both the Government and the Liberal Democrats to the strategic nuclear deterrent. If the future of the American commitment to NATO were not in doubt, we would not need to think about tactical nuclear weapons ourselves, because that role has always been fulfilled by US tactical nuclear weapons allocated to the defence of NATO. Will the Minister assure the House that we have sufficient confidence in the willingness of the United States, despite the present Administration’s attitude to NATO, that the co-operation that we need for the future of our strategic nuclear deterrent is not in doubt?

[Luke Pollard]

I can indeed. The defence partnership we have with the United States, particularly on nuclear deterrence, is a strong one. We know that President Trump and the US Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth, have reaffirmed their support for article 5 of the NATO treaty. As we build towards the NATO summit in The Hague, the UK will set out not only how we plan further to enhance our deterrence, but how we plan to ensure that collectively, across the NATO alliance, we are more lethal and more able to deter. The reason why that additional deterrence is necessary is the increased threats that we face as a nation, both conventional and cyber-threats, and increased nuclear threats.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 19th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

I absolutely agree. The UK is co-leading the drone capability coalition with Latvia, and we are improving and learning from the experiences of our friends in Ukraine. Drone technology in Ukraine iterates every two to three weeks, so it is absolutely vital not only that we create the environment for new investments in drone technology, but that the UK military looks at those lessons learned. I would expect a large part of the strategic defence review to be looking at the lessons that we can learn from Ukraine and applying them to our own military.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Unlike certain other institutions, NATO is an alliance of separate sovereign countries. I thank the Minister for his strong support of NATO, but does he agree that we should follow the example of the frontline NATO states like Estonia and Poland, which recognise that the difference between deterring a hostile Russia and actually having to fight a war is the difference between spending 4% or 5% of GDP on defence, as we did in the 1980s, and 40% or 50% if, God forbid, we ever have to engage in open hostilities?

[Luke Pollard]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that question. This Government are delivering for defence with increased defence spending. By April 2027, we will be spending 2.5% of our GDP on defence, which includes an extra £5 billion for defence in this financial year; that will rise to 3% in the next Parliament, when economic conditions allow. What we spend that money on is just as important, and that is what the strategic defence review, when it is published, will set out.

Fiscal Policy: Defence Spending

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 27th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

It is certainly true that the last time this country spent 2.5% of GDP on defence was under a Labour Government. The Tories cut defence spending as a percentage of GDP over their time in power. It is important that the strategic defence review wins cross-party support when published. I hope that the shadow Defence Secretary will be able to offer the Government a common position, so that what is published will be not just Labour’s defence strategy but Britain’s defence strategy, and we can be strong at home as well as secure abroad.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

If Labour colleagues are going to insist on reiterating that the last time 2.5% of GDP was spent on defence it was by a Labour Government, I suppose I have to point out that the last time 3% was spent by any Government it was by a Conservative Government, and the last time 4% was spent by any Government it was by a Conservative Government. Both those figures were some time after the fall of the Berlin wall. When the Berlin wall was still up, under the present accounting system we were spending up to 5.5% on defence, so please can everyone stop obsessing about 2.5% and when it will come in, because we need a lot more?

[Luke Pollard]

I have a lot of time for the right hon. Gentleman. He did not plug his “Shifting the goalposts?” Defence Committee report, which clearly set out changes in GDP spend on defence. I believe that he used the report to argue for more defence spending when his party was in power. Now that we are in power, we are doing it: we increased defence spending by £3 billion in the Budget and will lay out a path to 2.5% in the spring.

Chagos Islands: UK-US Defence Relationship

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 2nd December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

As the first Minister from the new Government to visit the Falklands, I was able to say clearly that the Falkland Islands are British for as long as they would like to be. The message I gave to the Gibraltarians was that Gibraltar is British for as long as the people of Gibraltar want it to be. I confirm to my hon. Friend that this deal secures the future of the UK-US base on Diego Garcia. That is something that our US allies have supported.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Which is more important for Britain’s vital security: to have the approval of the outgoing American President, or the approval of the incoming one? What is there to prevent China, with Mauritius’s agreement, putting listening outposts on other islands that could compromise the security of Diego Garcia?

[Luke Pollard]

There are specific arrangements in the treaty that prevent any foreign power from putting security apparatus or security forces on any of the outgoing islands. The right hon. Gentleman will be able to see that when the treaty comes before the House. In relation to the support of the United States, we would not have signed an agreement if it was not supported by our US friends. This deal secures the operation of the UK-US base on Diego Garcia well into the next century. I expect that when everyone looks at the detail of the deal, they will back it too.

Afghan Special Forces Relocation Review

Debate between Julian Lewis and Luke Pollard

Monday 14th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Luke Pollard]

I am happy to join my hon. Friend in doing so. When we look at the Triples in particular, it is apparent that there has been real advocacy from serving and former members in highlighting that there were inconsistencies in the decision making in support of individuals who put their lives on the line in support of our mission. That applies not only to those who served in Afghanistan; I say an enormous thanks to people who are supporting Afghans who relocate to the UK. I know that an awful lot of good work is taking place, including in Shrewsbury.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I recall that when the Minister and the Security Minister were campaigning previously on behalf of the Triples, there was some doubt about the comprehensiveness of the records that show which people had actually served in the way necessary to qualify to come to the United Kingdom. Is the Minister absolutely satisfied that there is no question of any records being withheld—for example, by special forces—that would help identify eligible former members of the Triples?

[Luke Pollard]

The review has not yet completed, but as part of it we are looking at evidence amassed across different Government Departments—where evidence of a direct employment relationship can be established. This excludes top-up payments and operational payments, which sit outside that. The right hon. Gentleman will know that I am unable to comment on special forces on the Floor of the House, but I can say that all parts of His Majesty’s Government that kept records of that are contributing to the review. I have to be cautious about this because of the ongoing Afghanistan inquiry, which is looking at elements of this, but I will happily pick this up separately with him.