Strategic Priorities Statement: Defence

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 25th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her question. I do not agree with her criticism of the Treasury, but I agree with what she said about risk appetite. That is exactly why, when the Chancellor wrote to the National Wealth Fund, she specifically said that the

“economic capital limit will … be increased from £4.5 billion to £7 billion, allowing”

the National Wealth Fund to “take on greater risk”, and giving greater “flexibility over its investments” to

“support more projects that struggle to access private finance”.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister welcome this Question from the Opposition? Does it not once again demonstrate the problems of Brexit? We hear every week about differences, and today they are complaining about access to aviation and defence. Is it not time that they changed their position and stopped asking questions that give us an advantage?

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

I am very happy to agree with my noble friend’s assessment of the damage that Brexit has done to our economy.