Royal Navy: Operational Capability

Lord Campbell of Pittenweem Excerpts

Wednesday 20th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, my understanding is that the quality of our training in anti-submarine warfare has not suffered, but the noble and gallant Lord is right to draw attention to shortages of skills in key technical areas such as nuclear and other types of engineering. The Royal Navy has this agenda very much in hand but it is a challenge—the Royal Navy is competing with industry for those skills. However, the picture is steadily improving.

[Lord Campbell of Pittenweem (LD)]

My Lords, an attack on undersea cables would be an illustration of hybrid warfare, or to put it otherwise, of using any available means for attack. What concern is being addressed in the Government’s current security review to hybrid warfare and the resources necessary to meet that challenge?

[Earl Howe]

The noble Lord is absolutely right that hybrid warfare presents particular problems and issues for decision-makers. The Ministry of Defence’s contribution to the cross-government capability review is looking actively at our future defence posture and how we can best spend our defence budget—our rising defence budget, I should emphasise—in the light of the various threats we face.