Situation in the Red Sea

Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts

Monday 5th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)]

The people of Scotland and elsewhere on these islands deserve to know what the plan is for this crisis in the Red sea—not the timings, the detail of missions, the tactical ambition or the resources behind these, but the broad strategy being pursued with lethal force in our name and in the absence of parliamentary approval. We have already made it clear from the SNP Benches that we support the Government and international partners in direct action to uphold freedom of navigation and the law of the sea, but this should never have been taken for granted and it remains subject to a realistic interpretation of both self-defence and imminence.

We see the toll that Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine has taken on our constituents and businesses over energy costs, so we cannot allow this to be compounded further by interrupting global supply chains, nor can we ever tolerate or stand idly by while seafarers are put at risk, whatever the supposed aims of the Houthis or their backers may be.

Will this be a sustained engagement? I do not know, and neither does the rest of Parliament. One way or another, an allied seaborne strike capability will be engaged, so with one of the two aircraft carriers in the Royal Navy out of commission again, the Type 23 frigate fleet on its knees, and the Type 43 destroyer fleet still going through PIP—the power improvement project—who in the Government has a grip of the Royal Navy’s resources? Fundamentally, what is the UK Government’s plan to ensure that this campaign is not escalatory, and what is the thinking behind any assessment that they have made?

In closing, this is not about supporting Gazans, or people dying or fleeing persecution in Gaza, but about the Houthis pursuing their own aims. However, I would be interested to know what the Government’s assessment is of the uptick in temperature in the middle east—in Gaza, in Yemen and with NATO ally personnel being killed.