Ukraine and Georgia

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 15th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Those of us on the SNP Benches join the cross-party support, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing the urgent question.

To follow the question from the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee on what more we can do for Ukraine, does the Minister agree that now is the time for the UK to join other NATO allies in supporting the Czechia munitions programme, on top of what has already been provided?

On Georgia, the Government state that their aim is

“to advance Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic integration through…security cooperation and support for democratic reforms.”

Given the Dream party’s lurch away from democratic reform, how stable is that integration and security co-operation? Does the Minister agree that it is time for the people of Georgia to have their say on the Dream party’s agenda?

[Leo Docherty]

We have not joined the Czech programme because it would replicate work that we are already doing, but we commend its activities and see it as part of a broader solution to mobilise effort to increase the flow of munitions, so it is welcome.

Clearly, the political future of Georgia is a question for Georgians themselves, but we note that there is a lively debate, which has of course spilled out on to the streets of Tbilisi, about the direction of travel. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the direction of travel—whether Euro-Atlantic or anything else—should be a function of the democratic expression of the people of Georgia.

Defence

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 7th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I am glad to be in the Chamber for this debate. It is an important debate; those of us on the Defence Committee would probably say that we do not have them often enough.

I wanted to pick up on a point made by the right hon. Members—my right hon. Friends, I hope—for Warley (John Spellar) and for North Durham (Mr Jones) about the reduction in defence spend, and the discussion we had at the Select Committee recently. As is our duty as a Committee, we challenged the Secretary of State on expenditure, and I wanted to pinpoint one specific issue, which relates to people—at least for us on the SNP Benches, people are the bedrock of a defence policy and posture—and to concerns about defence infrastructure and security, especially for those of us who live around nuclear defence infrastructure. We might not necessarily agree with it, but it is there, so we would hope it is secure at all times.

Coming back to the point that my right hon. Friends made, I wanted to look at some specific concerns about the Ministry of Defence police budget. In 2010-2011, the defence police budget was £154.8 million, equating to £226.78 million today when adjusted for inflation. Right hon. and hon. Members may correct me if I am wrong, but I think there was a Labour Government at that point. However, the budget in 2022-23 was £161.3 million. Leading back to the question posed at the Committee, that is a real-terms reduction of about £65.5 million in the defence police infrastructure over the past 12 years. That is something that Ministers might want to come back to later on.

The shadow Defence Secretary, the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), made some comments about the £75 billion, and I share his concern. Like me, he understands that the assumption from the Government is based on a baseline of spend, as a percentage of GDP, that is frozen in cash terms, so without borrowing or extra debt, it comes nowhere near £75 billion. I wish the Government well on that point.

I would maybe want to have a wee bit more of a conciliatory approach to this. There will be at least some consistency from the SNP Benches, which I am sure the Minister will appreciate. Although he and I have different views on the nuclear deterrent, we are at least consistent. It was quite interesting to see someone else getting taken over the barrel for that—it makes a change. On the commitment to Ukraine, the Minister can take it from the SNP that, whoever the Government happen to be this year or next year, say, we will also be steadfast on the support for Ukraine. The right to defend national territory, and the right to national self-determination, are elements of human dignity for any modern nation state and alliance. As I said, the gist of my remarks is in three things: people, place and our partnerships.

Let us talk about the ordinary ranks. That is a term that I find quite problematic. I come from a services family. My brother was a sergeant, and my nephew is in the forces as well—in the “ordinary ranks”. There is really nothing ordinary in serving.

[Richard Foord]

I think the term is “other ranks.”

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

Let me come to that in a second, but in common parlance, I think they are always called the “ordinary ranks”—[Interruption.] The Minister may want to listen for a wee second. Whether it is “other” or “ordinary”, that type of terminology says nothing about the men and women who served in Iraq, such as my brother; in Afghanistan; out in the Red sea, no matter what happens there—and there is concern that there might be mission creep—or in other deployments such as the joint expeditionary force in Estonia, which I know, as the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Estonia, that the Estonian Government welcome.

Those ranks deserve more from us—not just from the Government and the official Opposition, but from all of us as parliamentarians. They deserve it that we take them more seriously in the structure of how we support and pay them, and in their entire terms and conditions. I know that there is probably profound disagreement about my approach, which would be an armed services representative body. Although I am saddened that the official Opposition changed their position, if they form the next Government, the SNP would support their new approach, which we think is at least a step in the right direction.

However, I do not think that having a Government appointee represent the armed forces personnel is the right step forward, because the lived experience of members of the armed forces who have been on the frontline needs to form part of an understanding, as with any engagement on terms and conditions with a trade union, for example—although an armed forces representative body from this party is not a trade union and does not have the right to strike our proposals. We have to say to those ranks that we believe they can come together as a collective and have critical engagement with Government and, more importantly, with Parliament more broadly. We need to have that discussion with them; they need to be part of defence policy and posture. They are people we want to send to the frontline to fire a gun or a missile, but technically we are saying to them that we do not believe they have the capability of coming together to discuss and debate collectively their terms and conditions. I find that slightly bizarre.

If we do not engage with those ranks in a more robust fashion, as equals, we will go around a consistent revolving door of reports, as we have seen for years in Committees, especially the Defence Committee. I am mindful of the report produced by the Women in the Armed Forces Sub-Committee—I intimated that I would mention them—which was chaired by the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton), who is not here today. That report was profound. Do I think that if we do not have real engagement with the frontline, there will be substantial change? I have grave concerns that there will not be.

[James Gray]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about that close engagement with the other ranks. He might well benefit from serving on the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme, where he will discover that all of our time is spent with the other ranks.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I am grateful for that opportunity, but I have previously declined it for various reasons. I will get into that in a wee bit more detail and, although the hon. Member may not agree with me, I may want to reflect on some of the profound experiences that we saw in that report. I am afraid that we would not hear those things talked about on the armed forces parliamentary body. I am talking about ordinary service personnel, in private meetings with parliamentarians as part of a Committee inquiry, talking about the dreadful conditions that they suffer because of their gender, sex, sexuality or ethnicity. Some of it has been like a revolving door.

[James Sunderland]

I spent 27 years of commissioned service in the British Army. The hon. Member does the British Army a disservice.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I recall the hon. Gentleman chairing the Armed Forces Bill Committee during the pandemic, when we heard some really profound and challenging evidence. I do not think that he and I would disagree that it was challenging. The report from the hon. Member for Wrexham, a former reservist, was challenging. It was the bare reality of what many members of the armed forces had to go through. I am sure that he was in the Chamber when members of Pride were here to hear the Prime Minister’s apology to LGBT members of the services. That happened; it is not a figment of the imagination. It does not say anything about the abilities and capabilities of the vast majority of the armed forces.

To me it is more about the structure. How different it would be if we had a body in which members of the armed forces, elected by their peers, could engage with any Government in the future. We would then be in a far better position to have that debate and to actually target support where it is needed. I have not yet heard a convincing argument against that.

I am glad that the official Opposition have a policy on this matter. It might not be one that I think is appropriate, but it is a reflection that the time has now come to have some type of body to take up that physical challenge. I believe that their example is from Germany, but I am also mindful of the example of the Kingdom of the Netherlands—one of our closest military allies—where a member of the armed forces could also be the general secretary of a trade union. Having a distinct armed forces trade union does not stop them carrying out their duties as members of the armed forces.

One or two of our NATO allies have unions and actually have the right to strike, although that is not somewhere I would be going in terms of policy. I just think that having such a union is critical, given some of the conditions that members of the armed forces and their families have faced over many years. We have heard about them in Select Committee reports, in debates on housing and in statements. My friend the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) talked about Capita and some of the profound problems that members of the armed forces face on a daily basis. I honestly believe that they would be in a far better position to deal with these challenges if they were able to come together and deliberate and engage with whoever the Government are.

It is important to reflect on some of our Scandinavian allies when it comes to a more coherent approach to how we go forward as parliamentarians, because this is not just about members of the armed forces; it is about the role of Parliament as well. I have heard Members talk about having a more collegiate approach. Were we to follow the Danish or Swedish examples—this could be done whether or not the Government have a huge majority—it would mean that for an entire parliamentary term we could have an agreed military defence posture and an agreed budget. We could bring the main parties together and make a collective parliamentary decision.

The Nordic-Scandinavian model means that there is a good foundation to create a robust defence posture, with full parliamentary support. Even we in the SNP would agree to that. We may disagree on the nuclear deterrent, but Parliament has voted for that. But on the vast majority of issues I think the vast majority of parties in this place could agree and support a Government, which is critical given that the times in which we live need a coherent approach and full and robust parliamentary support.

I do hope that both the Government and the official Opposition will consider that if and when the next election is called, and whoever should form the next Government. That brings people together. It is also about us as parliamentarians taking our responsibilities appropriately, and about creating transparency and openness. Even in the United States, there is far more transparent and robust engagement with the Government on Capitol Hill by the Armed Services Committee. Of course, our Defence Select Committee has no such powers, in any shape or form, but if we had more open and transparent engagement at parliamentary level, we could hopefully overcome a lot of that.

The other thing I want to talk about, in bringing my remarks to a conclusion, is partnership. I am really glad that the shadow Defence Secretary mentioned some partnerships in bringing his speech to a close. Since 2016, we on the SNP Benches have been pushing for a more coherent mutual defence agreement with the European Union. He will need to correct me if I am wrong and that was not a part of what he said in his concluding remarks. The reason for that is not to replace NATO, but to understand that some of the complexities that EU members face—for example, when it comes to logistics, road design and bridge weights—could be tackled far more easily through the EU in partnership than, say, through NATO. That is because if we are trying to move a tank from the west to the eastern front, it has to get across France, Germany and so on. [Interruption.] I will conclude my remarks in a moment, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I say that as a Euro-Atlanticist. It is really important that we create defence relationships with people who share our common interests here in the Euro-Atlantic area, because, as others have mentioned, we face a crisis of retention, a crisis of recruitment and unfathomable black holes that I would not wish on any Defence Secretary, whether the present one or anybody who wants to be one. The next Government will face unimaginable tasks, but if we put people, place and partnership at the heart of that, we in the SNP—although with our differences on the nuclear deterrent—would certainly be willing to support that.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I am mindful of your dictum, Mr Deputy Speaker.

May I start by following up on the comments of the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) about Boeing, because it is about not just getting the contract right in the first place, but enforcing it afterwards? Even when Boeing and other companies have given assurances and agreements, they have not been held to account for them. I fear that the MOD will find a similar problem relating to the hack of the accounts of our personnel, in that the Treasury adamantly, stubbornly refuses to take past performance into account when assessing future contracts. That has to change. For heaven’s sake, I thought that one of the supposed advantages of Brexit was that we could take back control. By the way, our European competitors have been able to do that within the confines of the EU, but we have an ideological battle within the civil service, and Ministers have to take it on across Departments.

May I also apologise for—as is quite obvious—having a cold? It was acquired in good service, as the results in the west midlands last week showed, which colleagues will have noticed. I was hoping that the Minister for Armed Forces, the hon. Member for Aldershot (Leo Docherty) would respond to the debate and that he would at least acknowledge, if not welcome, that the council for the home of the British Army is now run by the Labour party, with its excellent leader, Keith Dibble. There is a lesson in that for us. Keith Dibble has been on the moderate side of the Labour party—pro-defence, pro-good sense—for many years and has built up a Labour group that can actually relate to the good people of Aldershot and Farnborough. That is also true in the wider sense for the Labour party. At certain stages in our history, Labour in opposition has been less sound on defence. That is not just a correlation, but a causal factor. Indeed, when Labour is sound on defence, as we always have been in government, the British people have confidence.

This year, we are celebrating the 75th anniversary of NATO—an organisation set up by the Attlee-Bevin Government, who also developed Britain’s nuclear capability. Throughout the changes of Government over that period, we have had a continuous at-sea deterrent. I have to say that Conservative performance has quite often not matched up to their rhetoric—we heard quite a lot of rhetoric from the Front Bench today.

At the end of the cold war, we had “Options for Change”: taking the peace dividend, cutting recruitment, running down equipment, and withdrawing our forces and armour from Germany. It looks as though we are going to have to remedy that at great cost.

We spoke earlier about the nuclear submarine renewal. In March 2007, under the Labour Government, this Parliament agreed to a motion moved by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Dame Margaret Beckett) on the principle of the renewal of the nuclear deterrent submarine programme, with the gateway stage to be further decided between 2012 to 2014. At that stage, David Cameron declined to do that, having allowed himself to be blackmailed—I say he allowed himself, because I do not think the Conservatives would have broken up the Government and given up their jobs, as California was not beckoning at that stage. We have therefore suffered considerable extra cost. Workforce teams have been broken up, the rhythm of submarine manufacture up in Barrow has been lost, and there has been an effect on the crews and our equipment. That is a real worry.

I also have a worry about our current submarine programme. I absolutely agree with the principle of the nuclear national endeavour, but I am very concerned about some of the detail. On the nuclear skills taskforce, the Government say:

“we are investing to increase our intake of nuclear sector graduates to around 2,000 in the next four years”.

When I posed a question to the Department for Education, I was told that there are 65 undergraduate enrolments in nuclear and particle physics courses and 190 postgraduate enrolments—a total of 255. I do not think they will all go into the defence industry, and I have found it hard to get data about how many of them are actually British citizens. Given the security requirements—if those who issue security clearance can get their act together—the Government are seriously underestimating the need to expand those courses and prioritise British students in our nuclear national endeavour programme.

On expenditure, I know from previous debates and from the Defence Committee that many Government Back Benchers agree with the critique and recognise that the dead hand of the deadbeat Treasury—not just recently but over the past 100 years or so—has seriously undermined Britain’s defence capability time and again. In the inter-war period, there was the infamous 10-year rule—defence expenditure was based on the assumption that there would not be a war for 10 years—and in 1915 there was the shell crisis.

It concerns me that, while history may not repeat itself, it certainly rhymes. Back in July 2021, the Defence Committee had General Hodges, the head of the United States Army Europe, giving evidence. He reported on the 3rd Division participating in an American warfighting exercise in Texas. The British Army ran out of every bit of important ammunition in about eight days of exercises. Nothing was done about it.

That was known, yet, when the Ukraine war started in 2022 and it became clear very early on that it was going to be very much an artillery war—there are newer drones and missiles and so on, but artillery plays a crucial role—it took from early 2022 through to July 2033 for the MOD to sign an agreement with BAE to produce the extra shells. There is not that sense of drive and urgency, especially when we are dealing with a country such as Russia that has put its whole economy on a war footing. Even now, we have only two artillery shell plants: Durham and Glascoed. Glascoed recently had demonstrations outside it by people trying to close it; why they are trying to stop them producing shells for Ukraine is another matter, and I certainly hope the union representing those workers will be taking up the case.

The United States has recognised that it cannot have single points of failure. In Glascoed there was recently an explosion; if it had been more serious, what would that have done to our capacity? The United States is building new, Government-owned, company-operated sites. It is not worried by the complaints about nationalisation; indeed, the powers given to the president to command industry are considerable. Yet we are still going through the same old, same old, relying on the companies putting in their cases. We do not have the luxury of that time.

I have been critical of Ministers and senior civil servants, but the senior military must bear responsibility for the situation as well. Year on year, they have focused on platforms rather than munitions or accommodation, and the costs of that are being seen in report after report from our Committee and indeed in the media. We must recognise that we now have a shortage not just of matériel, but of industrial capacity, plant, supply chain, skilled and production personnel, and any capacity to surge. We also have numerous single points of failure. I have mentioned the United States. France is commissioning a new explosive plant costing half a billion pounds, again recognising the shortfalls and the critical weaknesses in the system.

I am very pleased that although there has been a lot of focus on the nuclear pillar 1 in the discussions about AUKUS, in pillar 2 there is a lot of work on creating industrial capacity. I credit the Government with the work they are doing there on creating industrial capacity, but I stress that that cannot just be focused on the high-tech end. In many cases, our munitions and platforms depend on industrial skills and basic engineering, which are crucial to ensuring that they are maintained and that they work. We must recognise that we need that industrial base.

As the allies showed in world war two, we can shift domestic industry, plant and personnel to war production; Russia is demonstrating that today. Short-term cost-cutting, identified by the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford, will not do. Companies need workflows to create the workforce and the cash flow and to provide training opportunities for the workforce of the future. The Barrow submarine yard demonstrates the perils of running down the workforce. However, this is also about a pool of labour. For example, in the context of submarines there has been a great deal of talk about ensuring that people are trained in welding, but if other industries in other sectors are not also training welders, then—particularly if there is any drop in the workforce—they will go off and work in the oil and gas industry. Indeed, that is exactly what has happened, and incidentally it has also happened to parts of the United States shipbuilding industry.

We need a much more holistic approach across Government, because if people are being trained in one industry, it is impossible to control the flow out if there are opportunities elsewhere: there must be pressure on other companies to train as well. I have to say to the Minister that that is why the decision to offshore the commissioning of the fleet solid support ships is so incomprehensible. Given the need to maintain a workforce in certain yards and hence to maintain the skill base, shipping that out to Spain is scandalous. Furthermore, no other country, inside or outside the European Union, behaves in this way. The dead hand of the Treasury is dictating a policy that runs down our industry and ends up being much more costly in the long term.

The Ukrainian crisis has also revealed the need for effective collaboration. As the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford pointed out, we used to negotiate proper contracts of shared benefit, but going for “cheapest is best”—allegedly—has driven that into the ground. We need to work with other countries, which will include, as we have seen in the provision of munitions for Ukraine, working with European companies and European Parliaments. There will be no necessity to create new structures, but work will need to be done, and I suspect that there will be some willing partners in a number of the major European industrial countries, and that will mean a need for more real rather than financial engineers.

Finally—for I accept your strictures, Mr Deputy Speaker —I want to touch briefly on the subject of hybrid warfare and the so-called grey zone, on which our Defence Committee is conducting an inquiry. I do not want to pre-empt its findings, but I do want to urge the Ministry of Defence and the wider Government to take a broader, societal approach. The opponents we are facing, in Russia, China and North Korea, have the Soviet, Leninist methodology and ideology, across government and society. We have shown our ability to counteract that in previous conflicts, both hot and cold, but I think particularly of the Political Warfare Executive and the actions of the United Kingdom and the United States during the cold war. Sometimes the debate becomes a bit too focused on technology and techniques without an understanding of the political and ideological underpinning of conflict.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

One of the points that we have made previously in the Defence Committee concerns support for the Russian military archive, which was eventually moved to Shrivenham. Is it not about time the MOD took that archive far more seriously, given that it provides all the benefit of what the right hon. Gentleman is talking about?

[John Spellar]

What the hon. Gentleman refers to was just a manifestation of the running down of our Russia-watching capacity, in that context but also much more broadly within the system. I think there has been an attempt to repair it, but this should be a salutary lesson.

The present transformed security landscape requires money, manpower, mindset and matériel. We have to move further, and we have to move faster.

Defence Personnel Data Breach

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 7th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

As my right hon. Friend will know, the process of getting towards naming—if, indeed, a state-sponsored actor is involved—is a specific process set out by the Butler reforms, and it does take some time to reach such conclusions.

My right hon. Friend asked specifically about the ongoing work with the particular contractor. The Cabinet Office is calling in specialist analysts who will carry out that work over the coming weeks. There are two separate tracks in respect of the contractor in the MOD but also, separately, in the different places across Government that my right hon. Friend rightly identified. I stress to the House—because I suspect that this will be brought up a number of times—that we expect very high standards from our contractors that work with the lives and livelihoods of our service personnel, so we will take all appropriate actions.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance notice of the statement. There was not really much to disagree with in the questions from the shadow Defence Secretary, but I will perhaps ask for a little bit extra. On what the Secretary of State said in relation to there being a malign actor, I am sure that the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), who has been bobbing, will not miss the wall when he asks the Secretary of State a question.

There is a bit of concern about the contractor, because it has previous when it comes to delivering Government contracts. Notably, there was a scandal over NHS business services and the running of immigration application systems. Given the seriousness of this issue for the Ministry of Defence, will the Secretary of State advise the House on whether he has confidence that the contractor is able to continue to deliver the contract? Will he consider a review of the specific armed forces payment network element and whether the contract should be brought back in-house and delivered by the MoD, rather than by some conglomerate based in Paris?

[Grant Shapps]

I can confirm that that review is already under way, and I can go further by saying that I am deeply interested in how this contractor, or indeed any other, behaves. I cannot jump straight to the conclusion of that research, and I do not think the hon. Gentleman would expect me to jump straight to the conclusion of a security review. To answer his question in a more straightforward way, if it were found that there is a better way to do this and we could not be satisfied on security, we would of course consider other options, such as those he suggested.

Defence Spending

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State clearly has a herculean task to find £75 billion, so let us seek clarity on where it may be found. I welcome the investment if it is in capability. I agree with the shadow Secretary of State on why it was not in the Budget. I think we all know why: it does not stand up to scrutiny. Let me also welcome the Secretary of State’s investment in Ukraine, on the back of the US commitment. I have to say to our US colleagues that it was long overdue. Let me ask some specific questions. It is the duty of Opposition to challenge Government, and we will have our differences.

With no increase in borrowing or debt, the implication is that there will be deeper cuts to other public services. If the Government have assumed a baseline with spend frozen in cash terms as of GDP, as I think was alluded to by the shadow Defence Secretary, it comes nowhere near £75 billion. As I come from a services family, I wonder if the Secretary of State will commit to a direct increase in spend on accommodation, training and recruitment as part of this proposal, given that we are at a near Napoleonic decline on the frontline and have pushed members of the armed forces into food banks and near penury?

The Secretary of State and I will, of course, disagree on the nuclear deterrent, but I wonder if he will answer one specific point while he retains it. The nuclear enterprise has been exposed as unaffordable in the latest report by the National Audit Office. What assurances can he give the House that the nuclear deterrent will not continue to cannibalise the Ministry of Defence budget and, specifically, the £75 billion he has proposed today?

[Grant Shapps]

The first thing I should point out is that page 20 in the annex of the document before the House describes the uplift in the defence budget. We have headlined it as £75 billion. In fact, when we go through and add up the individual amounts year on year, it reaches £77 billion of expenditure. Members can see there exactly how we will get to it.

Secondly, it is fully funded. I know the Labour party does not like the idea, but we will remove 72,000 civil servants from the system, not because we do not think they are good people—fortunately, with low unemployment we know they will be gainfully employed elsewhere—but because we want to get back to the size of the civil service we had before covid, before it expanded greatly. We see no reason to continue to run a civil service with 70,000 additional people each year, when that money could go into the defence of the realm.

The hon. Gentleman asks about our commitment to our armed forces personnel, their families and their accommodation. He may have missed it in my statement, but I mentioned £4 billion that we will now invest in their accommodation and conditions over this period, thanks to this big uplift. He will be aware that last year there were a lot of problems with leaks and boilers not being fixed for considerable periods of time. There have not been those stories this year, because we got on top of that with £400 million and by making sure that contractors are doing their job.

As the hon. Gentleman rightly says, we have our differences on things like nuclear deterrence, but if there is one thing that benefits Scotland in particular, I would suggest it is what goes on at Faslane, with the extraordinary high-quality jobs it produces and the proud part it plays in this nation’s defence.

Armed Forces Readiness and Defence Equipment

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Well, this was a debate that certainly went in directions I never thought it would go.

It is always a privilege to follow the hon. Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck), who may be in a different party but is a very good friend on the Defence Committee. I commend the report from the Committee, of which I am once again a member. There are a few things we do not agree on, but on the vast majority of issues we do agree. That brings me back to the old Scottish nation’s motto, which is “In Defens”. I am very much akin to that. I also share some of the issues raised by the hon. Member for Rochdale (George Galloway) on how we do not push ourselves into conflicts that are unnecessary. I may come back to that in a few moments.

I want to come back to the points made by the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) on background and family. I have said umpteen times in the Chamber that my brother served in Iraq and had two terms in Afghanistan as a reservist. I will come back to the specific point on people in the armed forces later. The right hon. Gentleman talked about his dad. My dad is 99. I am lucky my dad is still here. He survived the worst aerial bombardment these islands have ever seen. It was only after about 75 years that the Government recognised that it was the worst aerial bombardment the UK had seen during the second world war. Last Wednesday, I was able to attend, as I try to every year, the 83rd commemoration of the Clydebank Blitz, which took place on 13 and 14 March 1941. I also stood at one of the mass graves in Clydebank on Saturday to lay a wreath on behalf of my constituents. I do so with privilege and in honour of our family of survivors.

I want to pick up on three points relating to readiness in terms of people, partnership and position, and how they link critically to the word resilience, which I think I heard some Members mention. The right hon. Members for North Durham (Mr Jones) and for Warley (John Spellar) are probably sick to death of me talking over several years about resilience, but it is inextricably linked to what readiness should be all about. Let me talk about people first and how resilient are the armed forces.

It is a pity that the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) cannot be here today—I did tell her that I would mention her today—because she chaired a sub-committee on women in the armed forces, which exposed some of the most profoundly difficult questions and scrutiny in Parliament about recruitment and retention that the armed forces have ever had to face. I hate the term “ordinary ranks”. What does “ordinary” mean—people on the frontline who have to go over the ditch? There is nothing ordinary about that. As I said earlier, my brother did it as a reservist, but the report exposed dreadful questions about women and members of black and ethnic minority communities. Why are we not retaining or even recruiting them? Why, moreover, are young men not wanting to join up? This returns me to the issue of terms and conditions, which I have often talked about.

I remember arguing with a former Chair of the Defence Committee—he is not here, but I see that the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) has turned up—who was also a former Minister. He had said that members of the armed forces were not employees or workers. That may be the case in law, but they still deliver a service. If we want to retain people, it is critically important that we copy what so many of our NATO allies do in recognising the value and worth of members of the forces—whether in the Royal Navy, the Army or even the Royal Air Force—and recognising their rights, one of which is the right to representation. My party and I have always said that we believe the armed forces require a representative body like the Police Federation.

The kingdom of Denmark, for instance, which paid the blood price in Iraq and Afghanistan, has a very robust armed forces representative body. The problem there is not about recruitment, but about how in God’s name you persuade people to leave the armed forces in Denmark, because it is such a good—wait for it—employer. They are still willing to go over the ditch and take up the cudgels on behalf of their country. That brings us to the question of how we should deal with people here in the UK who may be over-reliant on charitable organisations, which, of course, are very well-meaning and committed.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

I agree with the points that the hon. Gentleman is making, but I think that there must be a real, radical revolution in the way in which the armed forces not only recruit but employ people. The number of 18-year-olds is falling. We are going to need more flexible employment models enabling people to leave, come back in, have career breaks and so forth. Unless we do that, we will not be able to persuade them to join our armed forces.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman, and I am glad that his party has joined mine—I think; I am not sure whether this is still a Labour manifesto commitment—in recommending the introduction of an armed forces representative body. However, a critical issue is how the skills that already exist can be utilised. I cannot believe that I am going to use the word “emulate” when speaking of the United States, but that flexibility is emulated by the United States and also by many of our other NATO allies.

When it comes to readiness and having people on the frontline in the physical armed forces, I am not going to play the numbers game, because this is a political and philosophical issue. It is about how we retain and recruit. I think that fundamental rights for members of the armed forces should be enshrined in law. They should not need to go to those very well-meaning charitable organisations to receive assistance with housing, with their mental health, and even with their physical health. Members of the Danish armed forces who have suffered an injury do not go to a special unit; they go to a Danish national hospital like every other Danish citizen, because there they will benefit from the delivery of a robust public service.

That, in turn, brings me to the way in which the armed forces and, critically, the Army in particular have been challenged during the pandemic. Some former members of the Defence Committee who are not present today kept going on about the need for the Army to step up to the plate in dealing with resilience. The right hon. Member for North Durham has heard me talk about resilience in Committee. It is not, in my view, the role of the Army to pick up civilian action. During the pandemic, the Army in England and Wales had to do that in respect of the Nightingale hospitals, not just in terms of logistics and design but in terms of the actual physical infrastructure. Why was that? It was because most parts of the NHS procurement processes to build the Nightingale hospitals had been privatised years ago. We had taken a very physical state ownership of that civil structure of resilience and readiness out of the hands of the Government and the NHS and given it to private contractors, who have made billions on the back of it.

Let me give a Scottish example, the Louisa Jordan Hospital. The Army stepped up to the plate in helping with the logistics, but they were not required to build the internal structure of the Louisa Jordan. Most of it was in the Scottish conference centre. That internal structure was built through NHS Scotland procurement, because it was fit for purpose and ready to play its part. When we are talking about people, we should bear in mind that readiness is not just about members of the armed forces; it is also about the larger civilian infrastructure.

The right hon. Member for Warley is not present now, but he and I—along with, I think, the right hon. Member for New Forest East—travelled to Washington some years ago with the Defence Committee. Part of our purpose was to understand where our infrastructure was. How, for example, do we transfer, through partnerships between states—critically, within the continent of Europe —a division, or tanks, across bridges and roads which, since the end of the cold war, are no longer equal in terms of weight or infrastructure? How difficult is it to move a tank from a port to, say, technically, the eastern front if that is required? Partnerships of that kind have been allowed to disappear in the post-cold war era.

However, there are other important partnerships, such as the United Nations with its peacekeeping role. It was disappointing that not only the United Kingdom but other countries have had to pull out of Mali, at the instigation of the Malian Government, in the last couple of years. That peacekeeping role is a crucial part of the infrastructure of maintaining international order grounded in the rule-based system. I was also disappointed by the Government’s decision to postpone, or put into abeyance, their investment and funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Palestine on the basis of a very small amount of information, or accusation, from the Government of the state of Israel in respect of the conflict in Gaza. I hope that the Government recognise the value and worth of that partnership in trying to quell some of the many big problems that are faced in that part of the world.

I think I have had my 10 minutes, but let me end by saying a little about the European Union in relation to partnership and position. I was glad to hear that the official Opposition may now be considering an improved relationship with the EU. We in the Scottish National party believe it is important to have a mutual defence agreement with the EU. As for the question of position, I am a Euro-Atlanticist, and I think it important for us to reposition ourselves, away from the issues of the Indo-Pacific.

I agree with the hon. Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) about the nuclear proposition. I think that the hon. Member for Rochdale and I are the only Members present who oppose nuclear weapons, but I think there is general agreement on the need to take the deterrent into another budget heading so that we have a full understanding of what that two-point-whatever percentage of GDP is. I hope that the Government will be able to respond to that in the debate today.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

I started by knocking a glass of water over when I came into the Chamber, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I have finished by doing so.

I thank all Members for their contributions today, but I also thank the armed forces, as we all should, for everything that they do to keep us safe. Our UK armed forces are essential not just to the defence of our nation but to the members of our NATO alliance, and also to our UK role in upholding international law. We respect, as the world does, the professionalism with which they do their job.

I welcome the further AUKUS agreements that that are being signed this week between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. This is our most important strategic defence alliance outside NATO. It is so much more than a big submarine building programme. It demands UK national endeavour and UK national leadership, and it has the complete support of the Labour party.

President Putin claimed 88% of all the votes in last week’s Russian poll. It was a total sham of an election, but a serious moment for UK defence. Over the next decade, we will face Putin and an alliance of aggression from autocrats who have contempt for international law, and who squander freely the lives of their own people.

The Chair of the Defence Committee, the right hon. Member for Horsham (Sir Jeremy Quin), opened the debate by saying that we should start where all defence debates should start—with the threats that we face. The threats that we face will only increase, which is why we need a new era for defence, why these reports are so important, and why this debate is so important.

Madam Deputy Speaker, before you took the Chair, Mr Deputy Speaker said of this debate that it promised to be one of the best informed on all sides, and he was right. The right hon. Member for Horsham brought his experience not just as a former Minister, but as the Chair of the Defence Committee. I pay tribute to him, because we now agree that it is right to move away from competition by default and to see the defence sector as a “critical strategic asset”, as he called it, which is a reflection of the work that he has done.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) asked the right question: what are we doing to create new industrial capacity in the UK and in collaboration with close allies?

My hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier) said that she has seen the arguments and excuses, yet no efficiencies arrive. That was captured not just in her report, which is the subject of this debate, but in other reports that her Public Accounts Committee has undertaken into defence procurement since 2019, and in nine National Audit Office reports looking at the same problems.

The right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) made a very moving speech about his father’s D-day experience. I particularly enjoyed the emotive part of his speech, where he got stuck into the Government and the MOD.

The hon. Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) was quite right to say that we are now in a moment of existential risk, because we are not ready to fight the wars that we may face. It is a theme that picked up by the right hon. Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman), who said that we should be looking at not just our operational readiness, which is the subject of the Defence Committee’s report, but our strategic readiness. Part of that is about taking responsibility as a nation to develop greater resilience and, interestingly, greater talent, including in our political parties and in this House.

My right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) made a very strong argument for defence plans that are based on reality and on honesty about the UK’s role in the world, and especially the priority that we must give to our role in NATO. He, too, said that we must see defence investment directed first to benefiting the UK’s economy.

The right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Sir Alec Shelbrooke) has been a Defence Minister too, and he leads the NATO parliamentary delegation from this country. He was right to remind us that for NATO member nations, article 3, on the obligation to defend their own country, is as important and fundamental as article 5, on the obligation to defend each other.

My hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck) spoke in some detail about the equipment shortfalls that the Defence Committee’s report lays out, and rightly spelled out the concern that the MOD is covering up the scale of the problems by not providing information to the public or Parliament. That was echoed by the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord), who said that operational planning assumptions, which were published up until 2015, are no longer published.

The hon. Member for Rochdale (George Galloway) was right to talk about the concealment of truth about the state of our armed forces, but in fairness to the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford, that is exactly what the Defence Committee—he played a leading part in producing its report—is arguing the Government are not doing. Defending our people and our allies is not “Alice in Wonderland” or Gilbert and Sullivan; it is what people have a right to expect of their Government and Parliament.

Finally, we heard from the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes), who speaks for the SNP and has great experience on defence. I followed his three P’s, and I was particularly struck by his discussion of people. There is a requirement to do better in recruiting and retaining members of the armed forces. He argued that it is not just about numbers and that our forces must better reflect the diversity of the people they serve to protect.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Member for making those points, but I would push him on the issue of an armed forces representative body. Is it something that he and his party remain committed to?

[John Healey]

No, it is not. We have a much better solution, which is to legislate for an independent armed forces commissioner, like there is in Germany. They will be a voice for armed forces personnel and the families who support them, and will report to Parliament, not Ministers. In that way, we can reinforce the accountability of our military to this House and the public, as well as making it more responsive to those who serve. I will come to some points on that, if I may.

I pay tribute to all contributors to this debate, particularly those who are members of the two Committees on whose reports it is based. As they know, there are deep and long-running problems across defence, but I want to marshal my remarks into three main areas of findings in both reports: first, the hollowing out and underfunding of our armed forces; secondly, defence mismanagement and waste; and thirdly, the increasing lack of openness that we have seen recently from the Ministry of Defence.

On hollowing out and underfunding, my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields reminded us that it was the last Defence Secretary, the right hon. Member for Wyre and Preston North (Mr Wallace), who told this House last January that the armed forces have been “hollowed out and underfunded” over the last 14 years. These reports reinforce that sobering assessment of our UK military power and readiness.

The Defence Committee found that there are

“capability shortfalls and stockpile shortages”

across the forces, that resilience has been undermined by reductions, and that there is a

“crisis in the recruitment and retention of both Regulars and Reserves”.

Our armed forces are

“losing personnel faster than they can recruit them.”

The hollowing out and underfunding is getting worse, not better.

UK Armed Forces

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I call the SNP spokesman.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I congratulate the shadow Defence Secretary on securing the urgent question and join him and the Minister in remembering those on HMS Richmond.

On Friday, the Public Accounts Committee’s found that the

“MoD is increasingly reliant on the UK’s allies to protect our national interests. NATO membership deters hostility, but the report warns such deterrence can only be effective if our Armed Forces are credible.”

To paraphrase the report, given that many of our allies face similar capability challenges, is the Ministry of Defence developing mitigations for dealing with the risk of allied support being curtailed or withdrawn if, critically, there is a change of Administration in Washington come November?

[James Cartlidge]

To be fair to the hon. Gentleman, he makes an important point about the importance of alliances. NATO is fundamental to the defence of our country, the wider western world and our allies beyond. Critically, to put this in context when we talk about the state of the armed forces, which is what the urgent question is about, and the alliances that he referred to, let us remember that we have just launched Steadfast Defender, which is one of the largest ever NATO exercises, involving 96,000 personnel, of which almost 20,000 are from the UK. I believe that we make up 40% of the land forces. That is an extraordinary contribution by the UK. We also offer our nuclear deterrent to NATO. We are supporting our allies, we stand together under article 5, and we should all do everything possible to support NATO in its 75th year.

Situation in the Red Sea

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Monday 26th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

First, let me thank the Secretary of State for due sight of his statement. I think that, as an opposition party, we would give it our tentative support. What the shadow Defence Secretary said about possible mission creep does give us concern, but I am sure that it is the role of the Opposition to keep asking those questions.

The Secretary of State knows that my last question regarding this issue was on the position of the People’s Republic of China. Until recently, exports between Europe and China were in excess of £400 billion a year, and there is no doubt that they will suffer as a result of the extended time that it takes to travel between China and Europe, but what beggars belief is China’s utter silence in relation to what is going on—notably, given that it has a military naval capacity in Djibouti.

The Secretary of State and I will disagree on the issue of Gaza. If we had secured a real vote last week, we would probably have seen that recorded formally in the House. Gerald M. Feierstein, the former US diplomat, has said that

“the Houthis’ effort to insert themselves into the Gaza conflict”

is aimed at

“strengthening their support base in the country and cementing their movement more firmly in the… ‘axis of resistance’”.

I wonder whether, like me, the Secretary of State is concerned that we are not only strengthening that axis of resistance but, with illicit Chinese and Russian support, now broadening it in the Red sea.

[Grant Shapps]

I thank the hon. Member for his—as he has described it—tentative support. I have noted that the House has been largely unified on this issue during the past four statements, following previous attacks. He asks about the mission creep situation. I hope he feels reassured by the concept that we have waited longer, in part because the Houthis’ capabilities have been damaged, so that there is a longer gap and we do not see this thing speeding up. We have no intention or desire to see it increase, but we will act if there continue to be attacks on commercial and naval shipping.

The hon. Member asks about China and Russia and I have to say that I agree; it is important that countries that are impacted by this—the entire world, but perhaps China in particular—do speak up. We would welcome China being more vocal about the situation. As I mentioned in my comments, a Chinese vessel has been attacked, so this is of direct concern to the country. I call on China and, of course, Russia—for what it is worth—to be more vocal on these issues.

Lastly, I just do not accept this Gaza-Houthi connection. I remind the House that the Houthis were against Hamas until 2015, and now they arrive on the scene and pretend to support them. They are opportunist thugs taking advantage of the situation and of people’s lives and misery—not just in Gaza but in Yemen—and they should stop and desist immediately.

Ukraine

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for raising that matter. I am aware of his work in Congress—in fact, I think we were there at roughly the same time last month—and his clear explanations and lobbying of Congress to help release that money to Ukraine. His point is absolutely right: the aid package is in America’s interest not just to come to the rescue of Europe but because other despotic leaders, other autocrats and other regimes of any type will be looking at whether we simply lose and give up because we get bored of the fight and then walk away. They will draw conclusions about that and whether they can always take on the red line of the west and the no-go area if all they have to do is wait it out. This is why my right hon. Friend is right to say that it is indubitably in America’s interest to step in, because otherwise they will find it far more expensive in the future, perhaps in other parts of the world, to defend the world order.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Let me thank the Secretary of State for prior sight of his statement and reiterate the unequivocal support of SNP Members for the defence and, we hope, liberation of the rest of Ukraine in its battle against Vladimir Putin. I know he recognises that part of being an Opposition party is to highlight where we think there may be improvements, and I will highlight supply chain issues, which were alluded to by the shadow Defence Secretary.

Today, Ed Conway of Sky has been highlighting issues around sanction-busting exports from the UK, critically around heavy materials, notably car exports, saying,

“let's imagine you’re a Russian unit needing weapons. Imagine you rely on a certain input or tool from the UK. Back in the past you’d get it directly. But you can’t anymore.”

One solution that Ed alludes to is the setting up of shell companies in friendly Caucasus states, and notably in Kyrgyzstan. He says that since the sanctions, implemented not only by the UK, but other allies, exports from the UK to Kyrgyzstan of the very materials that those frontline Russian troops need have increased by more than 1,100%. Can the Secretary of State advise the House whether he will take that information away, engage with his Cabinet colleagues and write to me or the Defence Committee about how the Government will seek to block off those sanction-busting processes? Will he highlight to those companies that are participating that they are undermining the democratic value of the future Ukrainian nation?

[Grant Shapps]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for the support from the SNP, adding to the weight of support from this House for Ukraine, and for raising that issue. I read at length the excellent thread from Ed Conway this morning talking about this issue. It is the case that when sanctions are set up, initially they tend to work, but then, rather like water flowing around a boulder in the stream, people will eventually work their way around and find another route to market. It is important that we continuously look at and assess whether those sanctions are doing the thing we initially intended them to do. As Ed Conway points out in the thread, this is an international problem. He takes the UK as an example, but extends it out and says that it is happening elsewhere, too. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the British Government will be taking a close look at what is happening in reality. This is clearly a Treasury and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office lead, but I undertake to work with them, and I thank him for raising the issue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Monday 19th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Scottish National party spokesperson.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

On 17 February, at the Munich conference, Prime Minister Frederiksen of the Kingdom of Denmark said:

“If you ask Ukrainians, they are asking for ammunition now, artillery now. From the Danish side, we decided to donate our entire artillery.”

Does the Minister not agree that allies should be a little more like Denmark when it comes to recognising the consequences of not meeting Ukraine’s needs?

[James Heappey]

We are full of admiration for our Danish colleagues, but the reality is that the UK has provided almost its entire heavy artillery capability, in terms of AS-90s. Those that we have held on to are those that service the battlegroup in Estonia and the very high readiness armoured battlegroup. Similarly, we have been generous with our ammunition stocks, while retaining those that we need for our very high readiness forces. More than that, we have catalysed the production of 155 mm ammunition in the UK, and even further, we have been buying up as much 152 mm and 122 mm ammunition around the world as we possibly can. The UK’s contribution to the Ukrainian artillery fight is not confined to what we have in our own ammunition stockpiles; it is much, much bigger, and amounts to hundreds of thousands of rounds.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

To paraphrase a former Member, the Government’s response has been weighed in the balance and found wanting. Given the Czech Republic’s profound donations of artillery and shells, on top of the Danish donation, as well as a commitment of over 1 million shells from the EU, I hope the Minister can come to the Dispatch Box and correct the balance. Can he advise the House on how much of this new investment, which is welcome, is in tactical armaments and artillery?

[James Heappey]

The overseas ammunition acquisition plan from previous years remains broadly as it was, which amounts to about 300,000 rounds bought on international markets and provided to Ukraine. The 155 mm manufacture acceleration is subject to a different funding package that the Secretary of State and his Ukrainian counterpart have been working on. It is important to note that the £200 million additional money from last year to this is focused on the provision of drones, and those tactical drones are proving to be most significant, in terms of their impact in the battle space.

Nuclear Defence Infrastructure: Parliamentary Scrutiny

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 24th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I did not know I was so popular with Government Back Benchers.

[Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Now, now, now. We are not having any of that. That is not fair. The hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes) is popular and it is very good that there are so many Members here to listen to him. We will tell him why later.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I am very grateful for the opportunity that Mr Speaker has given me to raise an issue that I think we can all agree deserves wider attention and scrutiny. I do not think I have ever done an Adjournment debate on a Wednesday—or one so well attended, I have to say—and I am glad to be doing so at a relatively decent hour, not least because I know something is happening afterwards in this very Chamber.

I want to start with an appeal to those on the Government Front Bench and to anyone else who might be thinking of intervening. It is clear that I am a member of the Scottish National party and that this is a debate that concerns the UK’s nuclear enterprise. On that level it might be fairly predictable, but I hope that in preparing for this debate the Minister left at home or in the Ministry of Defence all the customary stuff usually reserved for SNP Members discussing nuclear weapons in this place. It may be tempting to play to our bases and paint this debate as yet more—forgive me for saying it, Madam Deputy Speaker, so close to Burns night—haggis-munching, burst-bagpipe whingeing, but I hope we can all agree that the trigger for this debate was some very serious allegations from a senior official. People across these islands who live beside, or in the vicinity of, nuclear-regulated sites deserve to hear a response to those allegations. I am glad to see the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) in his place as well.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

Not right now; if the hon. Gentleman would allow me to continue for a moment.

I am going to set aside my own and my party’s well-known and understood standpoint on the morality and utility of the nuclear enterprise, in order to focus on the specifics of the allegations made in the blog of 30 December by a well-known former adviser, Dominic Cummings. I hope that the Minister will reciprocate and show the House the respect it deserves. As another small caveat, let me make it clear from the outset that I understand three things about Dominic Cummings: that he certainly has his own well-publicised agenda when it comes to issues with the civil service, especially in relation to civil service reform; that he is demonstrably not as clever as he thinks he is; and that he has also been known to present “dead cat” arguments as a distraction from his own shortcomings—in this instance, the fact that the Prime Minister chose not to rehire him as an adviser.

[Jim Shannon]

The hon. Gentleman and I have different opinions about nuclear capability—I believe that we should have it, and the hon. Gentleman says no—but I think we agree on the issue of nuclear safety. Does he recognise that our nuclear defence is imperative to the security of the nation and to fulfilling international obligations, and also that that cannot be achieved without substantial investment? This is not optional; the money must be found, and found now, to ensure that we have not only nuclear safety but, just as importantly, nuclear capability.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

My answer to the hon. Gentleman is that he might as well stay for the rest of the debate to hear my view on that.

I have to say that Mr Cummings’s former role, and the nature of the allegations he has made, are such that it is bizarre, frankly, at least from my perspective, that the only attempt to scrutinise them is taking place not in a parliamentary Committee but in what, I have to say, is usually the graveyard spot of parliamentary business. Parliament is sovereign in everything, I guess, apart from the nuclear enterprise.

I will, I am afraid, quote from Mr Cummings’s blog quite extensively. I hope the Minister has already read it, but it is important for it to be read into the record of the House. There are two principal aspects to which I would like the Government to respond: first, the state of the defence nuclear infrastructure across these islands; and secondly, the decision-making process in the civil service and how it relates to democratic oversight. I should also say, before the Minister uses up some of the time for his response to say it, that I am not expecting him to comment, in any shape or form, on operational matters. I understand that much that is to do with the nuclear enterprise cannot be discussed publicly.

So let us begin. Unfortunately, I cannot leave out all the internal machinations of the Conservative party’s psychodrama, as some of it is quite pertinent. Cummings begins:

“I did have two conversations with the PM, the first in 2022 just after he became PM.

The PM wanted an actual plan including how to grip power and get things done, a political strategy and a political machine to change the political landscape and beat Labour.

In 2022 I said I might do it but my conditions were the ability to ensure that urgent action is proceeding on a range of fundamentally critical issues including:

the scandal of nuclear weapons infrastructure which is a dangerous disaster and a budget nightmare of hard-to-believe and highly classified proportions, and which has forced large secret cannibalisation of other national security budgets,

building defences for natural and engineered pandemics,

the scandal of MOD procurement, ignored despite (even because of) the biggest war in Europe since 1945,

AI and other technological capabilities,

the broken core government institutions including the dumpster fire of the Cabinet Office.”

Cummings ends this section by saying:

“In all of these areas I started crucial work in 2019-20. Most of this has stopped, slowed, or reversed.”

Not all of that is pertinent and, particularly in that last line, we see Cummings’s own agenda coming through. None the less, I would say that points 1, 3 and 5 are of the most interest to us here. Let us start with points 1 and 3, and return to point 5 later.

Cummings continues:

“For example, in 2020 we agreed (via a secret ‘tunnel’ process with the services, HMT and Cabinet Office, chaired by the Cabinet Secretary and me, but kept secret from Wallace) the first agreed-by-everyone-to-be-honest MOD budget numbers since before 2010, agreed how to plug the massive black hole partly created by the nuclear enterprise disaster, agreed a range of disasters that should be stopped immediately (e.g AJAX, Challenger), and agreed a plan for procurement reform and new capabilities to build. (Also NB. the Army did NOT lobby for a bigger army—in the world that seemed possible in 2020 of a serious plan and honest numbers and procurement reform etc, they preferred a smaller army with real capabilities to a ‘bigger’ but increasingly Potemkin army.) Instead, the MoD has been allowed to:

pocket the money for the black hole,

avoid stopping the disasters,

continue pumping more money down the drain of legacy disasters creating a new black hole,

continued to allow critical parts of the nuclear weapons infrastructure to rot creating further massive secret budget nightmares as well as extremely serious physical dangers (cf. the recent near disaster with a submarine),

continue as normal with disastrous procurement policy and practice, instead of taking industrial capacity seriously,

continue sacrificing critical new capabilities to fund legacy failures,

shred the honest budget numbers and return to the fraudulent numbers, and”—

most critically—

“continue lying even more to MPs and media about it all.”

Let me repeat that I do not expect the Minister to comment on operational matters or give away classified information, but can we at least agree that these are serious allegations on both a specific and a more general matter? Specifically, can the Minister comment on the suggestion that the nuclear enterprise is causing the

“large secret cannibalisation of other national security budgets”?

To add a little bit of context, while it would be tempting to pass this off as the ranting of a jilted former senior adviser, this tallies with a lot of what we have heard from recent National Audit Office reports. The latest report, received just in December, revealed not only that the plan was “unaffordable”, that the MOD acknowledged this fact and that the funding gap could range between £7.6 billion and £29.8 billion, but that

“Nuclear and Royal Navy Costs show the greatest increase compared with 2022”—

the Navy of course being the service that is responsible for the continuous at-sea deterrent.

Furthermore, paragraph 16 of the report’s key findings stated clearly:

“The creation of a ring fence around nuclear funding helps protect the MoD’s highest defence priority but puts greater pressure on programmes not included in it.”

Does the Minister acknowledge that the ringfence is putting pressure on the rest of the conventional budget? If so, do they think this is sustainable? Can they also tell the House what plans the Government have to mitigate the dead hand of ringfencing? There is an unfortunate logic to this nuclear ringfence within the Government’s well-intentioned ringfence around defence spending, be it at 2% or 2.5%. At this moment, every penny spent on the nuclear enterprise is a penny less spent on conventional assets, at a time when conventional threats are proliferating —a point I made in this very place only a few hours ago.

Cummings adds a dash of colour to the NAO’s necessarily black and white findings about MOD mismanagement and dysfunction. Taken together, they are a damning indictment of where Defence finds itself, and it is a shame that there is something of a taboo around discussing the contribution of the nuclear enterprise to this predicament. There are undoubtedly massive consequences and contingencies that need to be developed surrounding as large a transition as the one the nuclear enterprise is undertaking just now. We know this because His Majesty’s Government already went through a similar transition from Resolution to Vanguard. Because of “The Silent Deep”, the excellent and definitive official history of the Royal Navy submarine service, written by Peter Hennessy and James Jinks and released in 2015—a book I recommend to Members—we also know that extensive plans were made for worst-case scenarios during that transition, including

“moving a Polaris submarine into Loch Long, where it would dive and remain in a static location on Quick Reaction Alert.”

Again, I am not asking the Minister to comment on operational issues, but a pattern is emerging of events and scenarios that are consistent with reports and papers written by nuclear analysts dealing with the consequences of an ageing platform, against the backdrop of a defence budget put under pressure by an increasingly dire economic situation.

Whether it is the accident involving a Vanguard-class submarine, which we spoke about in November—an accident that Cummings attributes to poor infrastructure —or the pitiful sight of another Vanguard-class boat returning to HMNB Clyde in September, looking rather the worse for wear, only for the MOD to release a statement praising the crew for the longest SSBN patrol, something does not quite add up.

We sometimes stray too close to specifics, so I will return to another aspect of the Cummings blog—an aspect that, if anything, is more worrying. It brings me to the parliamentary aspect of the title of this evening’s debate:

“Since we left, No. 10 has allowed and even encouraged all this. The cycle of disaster, cheat, lie and classify even more has continued through successive defence reviews (e.g. the infamous ‘Heywood wedge’ overseen by Heywood, Osborne and McPherson in 2015). We drew a line under this systemic lying and delusions in 2020. After I left the line was immediately deleted and business as usual has continued. The system is preparing to give Starmer the same horrific choices on above-STRAP3 yellow paper and continue the cycle of classify, punt, and lie with everything becoming ever more hollow-Potemkin as a result.”

That is a lot, so let us focus on the idea that

“The system is preparing to give Starmer the same…choices”.

It is nothing more than an insinuation that senior members of the civil service and the armed forces, according to Cummings, seem to be planning to manipulate an incoming Prime Minister who, if recent polls are to be believed, will have a significant mandate. Not only that, but it insinuates that they have used the protocols and security around the nuclear enterprise to manipulate the current Prime Minister and his predecessors, and have sought to remove any aspect of Cabinet decision making by excluding the then Defence Secretary from those discussions.

As I said, my party does not agree with this, or with the nuclear weapons policies of this Government and previous Governments. Regardless, this debate is not about that; it is about the way in which His Majesty’s Government implement their own declared policy. It is an unfortunate but inescapable reality of the nuclear enterprise that many of the discussions around it cannot be held in public—[Interruption.] I will come to a conclusion. Do not worry, the Minister will have his 10 minutes—and then his photograph.

The whole number of discussions must therefore be taken in an increasingly tight series of concentric circles. The one fig leaf for our parliamentary democracy has always been that, at the end of it all, there is an element of democratic oversight, with the Prime Minister, the Defence Secretary and, on occasion, the Foreign Secretary having input into the nuclear strategy.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

Will my hon. Friend give way? [Interruption.]

[Deidre Brock]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate on a crucial issue. He talks about secrecy. Does he know about the MOD’s response to my recent questions on safety at its nuclear bases? The response confirmed an alarming trend, with the number of incidents at Faslane and Coulport jumping by a third in 2022, and the figures for the start of 2023 suggesting further rises. Does he agree that surely we have a right, as Members of Parliament, to know why safety records are not improving, as well as the nature of these incidents and their effect on local residents and the environment?

[Martin Docherty-Hughes]

I could not disagree with my hon. Friend at all.

Of course, if any of the allegations made by Dominic Cummings, crucially those on senior Ministers being manipulated, are without merit, I would be glad to hear it. Alternatively, those civil servants themselves should address them directly.

Let me bring my remarks to a close with a final plea for the Minister—[Interruption.] I know that Members are here to have their picture taken—it might be useful, as it might be the last parliamentary one they ever have. Let me bring my remarks to a close with a final plea for the Minister to stick to the substance of some basic questions I am asking him. We know the opinion about the nuclear enterprise, so let me make this a bit easier and keep to just two questions, if the Government do not want to address anything else that I have said. First, what are the Government doing to ensure that the nuclear enterprise does not continue to exert undue pressure on the rest of the defence budget? Secondly, what safeguards are there to ensure that there remains a robust and genuine democratic oversight of all aspects of that enterprise?