King’s Speech

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Thursday 21st May 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I wish to raise three issues: Israel, Ukraine and defence expenditure.

Since 2022, I have been challenging in this House the billions being spent on the war with Russia, which I have repeatedly opposed in over 30 interventions in debate. Contributing to this crisis are our failures to hold in check American policy on NATO expansion, thereby breaching the neutrality of east European barrier states’ status, which is so important to Russia; our support for Ukraine membership of NATO, only later qualified; our failure to press for early withdrawal of the other battalions following the Maidan revolution; and, in my view, a complete misreading of events in Donetsk and Luhansk. The consequences of these policies have been not only economic but have enabled a powerful UK defence lobby to mobilise and use the crisis to demand increases in defence expenditure. I view Russia’s brutal, aggressive, war-mongering response and regrettable turn to the East and China to be a direct consequence of western miscalculation—all avoidable. Unfortunately, my Government have found themselves locked into this strategy.

I move on to Israel, the war and the Palestinian question. The debate has, unfortunately, become submerged in discussion over antisemitism, thereby diverting us from the real debate. It is hard to know where to draw the line, thus the dispute over the London marches. As a great admirer of Israel, which I first visited as a schoolboy in 1959, like many of my friends I am torn. Trump’s position, as set out in Jared Kushner’s paper on the vision for peace, is at the heart of the problem. The plan proposes a Palestine without borders, landlocked inside a greater Israel, with Palestinian enclaves under Israeli control. The plan, which is opposed throughout the Middle East, is further deepening and aggravating the existing conflict. In my view, the Government are right to keep out, and the Prime Minister has stood firm.

I move on to defence expenditure. I understand that my noble friend Lord Robertson of Port Ellen has proposed a 5% target. My 10 years on the Public Accounts Committee in the Commons, followed by my reading of the brilliant exposé on waste in defence procurement by Lord Levene of Portsoken, leave me wary of any demands for substantially increased resources. Yes, some increase is needed, and we are delivering, but I say that we should cut the overcharging, waste, gold-plating and contract revisions, and find another Peter Levene—and then we can talk.

Before we accept the notion of an increased worldwide threat, which I reject, we need to reflect on whether we would be credibly arguing for substantial increases if we were to settle the conflict in Ukraine as per Trump and then sought to influence Trump over Israel, seeking a more considered approach without our being accused of undermining Israel’s need for security. I strongly believe that, with careful diplomacy, we can reduce world tension. The question is whether the brilliance in diplomacy that characterised Foreign Office thinking over generations is still there. In my view, our mistake has been to fail to support Trump over Ukraine. That failure by the western democracies, in particular in Europe, has cost us dearly.

Trump is now questioning and challenging not only our wider European policy agendas but the relationship between America and Europe. The little Englanders who keep us outside of Europe should keep that in mind. Their case is dying on the cross of American isolationism. We should have supported Trump’s Ukraine initiative. If we had done so, we could have influenced the events in his war with Iran and probably the future of trading relations with the United States. Furthermore, perhaps as a consequence, we could have curtailed the opportunist relationship Russia is now developing with China, for which we bear some responsibility. When Russia finally implodes, the truth will no doubt come out. I know my views are minority views, but I thank the House for its tolerance.