Defence Capabilities: EUC Report

Lord Liddle Excerpts

Wednesday 24th October 2012 Grand Committee

[Lord Liddle]

My Lords, this is an excellent report, and it was well introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. I do not think that I will speak for long because the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, has said what I intended to say.

I believe that, in terms of the general context of our deteriorating relationship with the European Union, we should seize with both hands the opportunity to lead in Europe on questions of European defence capabilities. The Foreign Secretary made his first speech about Britain and Europe yesterday. I think it is the first major speech he has made on the subject since he became Foreign Secretary. From my perspective as a committed pro-European, it was not as bad as I might have feared. He is right, of course, that we are moving to a variable geometry Europe. There is no prospect in the near future of Britain becoming part of the euro inner core, but there is a real opportunity here for Britain, and it is disappointing that the Foreign Secretary did not take it and emphasise it. There is a real opportunity for Britain to take a much stronger lead on European defence. I would like to hear from the Minister how he sees this key strategic question for Britain.

One of the key points that the report emphasises, which I think a lot of people in the Conservative Party get rather mixed up, is that NATO and the EU are not a choice. Seeing NATO and the EU as some kind of choice is the problem as regards a lot of people who are reluctant to go down the EU defence road. I just do not see that. What I see as a problem is that we are no longer engaged in an existential fight for freedom as we were for much of the post-war era and America’s priorities are changing. We see a shift from its willingness ultimately to rescue us in the former Yugoslavia, in both Bosnia and Kosovo, to the attitude it took towards Libya and now Syria. There is a shift in the US outlook, and Europe simply has to get its act together if it wants to be in a position to defend its values and interests. We, more than the United States, are on the front line of terrorism in Europe, and we face a more immediate threat from failing states in Africa. We stand to lose more from the Middle East conflict. Our neighbourhood is a very unstable place. We have to find a way of seizing the opportunities of the Arab spring. Europe has to get its act together. One of the strengths of the European Union is that it has potentially a lot of soft power; for example, in its trade relations, in the aid that it can give and in the cultural and diplomatic relations that it can offer. Nevertheless, it also needs that hard, military capability to intervene if necessary, which is so badly lacking, as was shown in the recent Libya campaign.

I do not think that the challenges of austerity for defence budgets are going to go away in the present decade. We have to face the fact that the pressure on defence budgets is going to get worse. I do not think that we have seen the worst of what is likely to happen to the UK defence budget. I would not say that we have reached, as it were, the bottom baseline. For Britain, it poses some very big choices. We have already, without actually saying so, abandoned the idea that we have the full range of capabilities that the US has, except on the smallest scale. Nevertheless, we face the challenge of making procurement cheaper, and common procurement through the European Union is one of the ways of doing that. In addition, we have to think about how we share roles and how we specialise in roles with our European partners. This is a very touchy subject because it goes to the heart of national sovereignty, but we have to face up to it if we are going to be honest about what we are going to be able to do efficiently within our limited budgets.

I am not saying that we have to go for the full community method on defence procurement or anything like that. I think that we need more practical co-ordination, but we should not be ruling out using EU methods where they might work and where they might lead to better value for money and enable the defence budget to be more effective. There is a real challenge for us because of the budgetary position, but also a real opportunity to lead in Europe, and I hope that the Government will take it.