Lord Skidelsky
Main Page: Lord Skidelsky (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Skidelsky's debates with the Home Office
(13 years, 1 month ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Henley
My Lords, it is early days for saying much about the pilot other than that it looks as though it achieved rather good results by focusing on the more high-risk people rather than on the lesser ones. However, no doubt we will be able to tell the noble and gallant Lord more in due course once the pilot has been fully assessed.
Lord Skidelsky
My Lords, I am sure the Minister is aware of Adam Smith’s famous remark that defence is more important than opulence. Does he agree that defence is also more important than austerity, and that the security of the realm should not be sacrificed to the cuts?
Lord Henley
My Lords, we have not sacrificed the security of the realm to cuts either in this area or in other areas. However, I thank the noble Lord, as always, for bringing to my attention another bit of Adam Smith that I was unaware of, but then I was never quite as well educated as I ought to have been, if I had had the chance of sitting at the feet of the noble Lord at an earlier stage in my career.