Defence Supplementary Estimate 2021-22

Robert Syms Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer (Plymouth, Moor View) (Con)]

Thank you for calling me early in this debate, Mr Deputy Speaker. I want to start by talking about a couple of the points mentioned by the right hon. Member for Warley (John Spellar), which I completely agree with, on mindset and attitude towards defence. He was nuanced and careful on that. As everybody knows, I have campaigned on defence issues for a long time. I am no expert on procurement and I pay tribute to this Minister, whom I worked alongside when I was a Minister, for his attitude towards it. I have found that there has been a significant step change there. When it comes to finance and investment the figures are undeniable and show that over about 50 years, roughly through to the 2020s, there was a decline in investment in defence, by Governments of all colours—we have seen that across the pitch. As this Prime Minister keeps mentioning, we have seen small increases between 2020 and 2022, and the projected increases as well, but I really want to get across to Members here today and to other Members that these increases are in CDEL—capital departmental expenditure limits. The problem with that is that our RDEL—resource departmental expenditure limits—which is our spending on people, continues either to flatline or decline. That means that the experience of those serving in the military continues to go down. Despite valiant work by lots of people to try to improve it, the reality is that if we continue to ask our people to do more and more with less and less, that affects the experience and the “elastic band” in the middle that is taken up by people who do it because they are patriots and believe in defence, as many Members of this House do. That is fine, but they get worn out and are then pushed into society, and a new group comes in. If we continue to have that mindset—that we can burn these people out because new ones will come in—we will see a degradation of defence capability, which we have seen, and we will end up with an integrated review such as we saw.

I thought some aspects of the IR were good, but I have said, both in public and in private—even though it is not easy to say—that aspects of it were dishonest. I do not think we can truly focus entirely on our capital spend and say that our defence capability has expanded so much because we have all this high-tech weaponry and suddenly have this huge shift to high-tech warfare, while also talking about contributary pensions in our armed forces for the first time in the UK’s history. Again, we need to look at what that means for people who are serving. I remember some painful discussions about that, and it was quite a lonely experience. Although the capital expenditure is exciting, we have to be really careful on our resource spend, which is incredibly important.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very good point. A smaller military would find it more difficult to go to train nations such as Ukraine. We have a very good tradition of having people train other nations to defend their sovereignty.

[Johnny Mercer]

That is a really fair point. That was the whole point of enforcing things such as the Ranger battalions, but it was founded really on something that is not true, which is that mass is irrelevant—it is not. Data, technology and all this stuff is important. But look at what is happening in Ukraine now. Why are the Ukrainians holding out when everybody talked about how they were going to get flattened by the Russians? They are holding out because warfare has fundamentally changed: it has changed from the cold war—this is not the cold war reheated—and it has changed from Iraq and Afghanistan. These are Ukrainians, not Iraqis or Afghans riven by tribal disputes. It is fundamentally different and the technology has changed it. What can be done with an NLAW—a next generation light anti-tank weapon—is so different. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) was in the Army, much like when I was, people had to fly an anti-tank weapon—it actually had a wire coming out the back—and basically steer it on to the tank. The chances of doing that in combat were pretty slim—

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[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. Before the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) comes back, I think it is important to let hon. Members know that I will have to impose a time limit when he has finished, otherwise we will simply not get everybody in. The time limit will probably be around six minutes, depending on how long he takes.

[Sir Robert Syms]

rose—

[Dr Lewis]

I will briefly give way, and then I will conclude.

[Sir Robert Syms]

There are one or two other lessons from the current conflict. One is the impact of mobile phone cameras and psychological ops on the way in which a country communicates with itself and the world, and I think we could learn from that. I think we have lost a lot of the skills that we had in the second world war and when we were facing the Soviet Union, and this is one area we need to look at.

[Dr Lewis]

I quite agree with both my right hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) and my hon. Friend.

Bearing in mind your advice, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will conclude with one point about the budget itself. During the period in which I chaired the Defence Committee, we produced two reports—one in 2016 called “Shifting the goalposts?” and the other an update to that report in 2019—with the purpose of setting very firmly on the record what the proportion of GDP spent on defence had been historically on a like-for-like basis. It is a fact that, in the aftermath of the Korean war, defence spending as a proportion of GDP at one point was as high as 7%. In about 1963, it crossed over with spending on welfare at 6%. That was all a long time ago, but as recently as the 1980s the spending on health, education and defence was roughly the same at just over 4% of GDP.

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[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

It is quite clear that since we ran down our defence establishment following the cold war, events have proved that we need to spend a lot more on defence. One thing about the cold war was that it froze a lot of conflicts in the world, because it involved the two great powers. Since we ran down our defence spending in the 1990s, we have been committed for years and years to several conflicts, firing in some and peacekeeping in others, so there has been a tremendous strain on the military budget over a long period.

The strength and value of our defence establishment is in the leadership, training, tradition and morale of its people. Our services have quite often been deployed with kit that is older or is not that good, but because of the quality of those men and women, they have been able to fulfil their task. What is coming out clearly from this debate is that we need more boots in the military, because that gives us a lot of options.

One thing we know is that while Ukraine has a defence establishment of about 200,000, it has 400,000 veterans in the Donbas, it has militia and volunteers and there are probably several hundred thousand people with Kalashnikovs running around, which is why the Russians are having a terrible problem. Being armed with modern anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles adds a little bit of edge to that.

I think we need to revisit the integrated defence review, and I think we will need to spend more on defence. If Members disagree with that, they should talk to their constituents, because I think most of our constituents realise that this is one area in which we have to get it right. We need only look at a country where, in blocks of flats, schools and hospitals, children are being killed to realise that our own first duty as a country is to defend our realm—within NATO, but we must also have the ability to do this ourselves, because ultimately it is our responsibility to protect our fellow citizens.

This is, I think, a wake-up call for us, and I am sure that the Government will listen to what people are saying. The only question is whether we end up at 3% quickly or slowly, because I think that that will be the direction of travel. We need new kit, but it is it is clear that unless we increase the defence budget, we will not retain the personnel and secure the equipment that we need to remain a substantial military power. There are items in the review that we were going to do without for a while, such as AWACS—the airborne warning and control system—and I think that that is very short-sighted.

Let me say to the Minister that I think the Ministry of Defence will receive substantial support, from some Opposition Members and certainly from many Conservative Back Benchers, for a review of where we are now and where we are going to go. History does repeat itself. Sometimes we think it will not because no one will be stupid enough to do what people have done before, but we need only look at the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-40 to see many parallels with what is taking place now.

This country has much to be proud of in its support for Ukraine. I would not particularly like us to be fighting tanks at the moment, because I suspect that we are rather short of anti-tank missiles—I hope the Minister is ordering new ones just in case—but the simple truth is that we need air power, we need more power in the form of ships to support our aircraft carriers, and we need more of our Army personnel.

As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), people have been training the Ukrainians for seven years, and some 22,000 have now been trained. I am sure they are putting that training to very good use at the moment in fighting for their survival. The British Army, even when it is not fighting, can help our friends by using its skills and abilities to ensure that the military in other countries gain the benefit of our experience. Of course, we have been at the other end of wars, driving along roads when people have shot at us, and we have learned many lessons over the years that we can impart to our friends.

I also think—my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) understands this—that we should take on the lessons about psychological ops, propaganda and putting one’s own side of the story. Communicating with people is very important, and the Ukrainians, whatever their military skills, have the support of the world because they were quick to do that. The Russians may be just a Soviet tribute act, but they are behaving in exactly the way the Soviets would have behaved, spreading disinformation and not being honest with people. I have been amazed at the bravery of ordinary Russian citizens who, although they do not get the full truth from their media, have been willing to demonstrate and to be arrested and beaten. I wonder how I would behave if, living in Moscow or St Petersburg, I opposed an invasion. Would I be brave enough, or would my family be brave enough, to demonstrate in the same way? People show courage in tremendously different ways. You can be brave on the battlefield, but not quite so brave when you think you are going to be beaten over the head by a policeman or chucked into jail.

I think that the direction of travel in defence has to be more resources. We have to look at the integrated defence review. There will be a great deal of support from Conservative Members for moving from 2%—however the figures were added up—towards 3% or more. As a rich nation we can afford to do that, and I think we would be foolish not to do it, because at the end of the day everything else is trivial if people are in the situation that the Ukrainians are in.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I want to start the wind-ups at 6.30 pm, and I have four speakers left. That means that I will have to reduce the time limit to five minutes per speaker.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Syms Excerpts

Monday 20th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Member has obviously missed the point that we have nationalised Aldermaston recently in completely the opposite direction.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

6. What steps his Department is taking to help support defence exports.

[The Minister for Defence Procurement (Jeremy Quin)]

Alongside the Department for International Trade and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, we are hugely supportive of defence export campaigns to our friends and allies, a posture reinforced by the defence and security industrial strategy. I have conducted regular meetings on exports in Poland, Finland, Ukraine and Greece over the course of the summer. Tomorrow, I will engage in meetings in Tokyo before joining potential international partners on Type 31 in Rosyth, Babcock having announced only last week a frigate deal with Indonesia.

[Sir Robert Syms]

I congratulate the defence team on all the work that they are putting in to get more defence exports: not only is it good for British defence, but it is good for jobs. I have one concern, though: the licensing system seems to have slowed down, not only because of covid, but because it is very bureaucratic. Could the Minister take that up with the Department for International Trade, which deals with the matter, and have a word with it to try to speed this up? I fear that some of my local companies are losing business.

[Jeremy Quin]

I think that 11,000 licences were granted during the covid period, but I note my hon. Friend’s concern, which I know is a real concern shared elsewhere in the House. DIT attempts to say that 70% of cases will be dealt with within 20 days and 99% within 60 days, but as we set out in DSIS, we need to get better both in transparency and in speed. We will be taking the matter up. I thank him for the question.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Syms Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

21. What steps his Department is taking to (a) recruit and (b) retain service personnel.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

24. What steps his Department is taking to (a) recruit and (b) retain service personnel.

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[Mark Lancaster]

A training ship, Upholder, in Chelmsford is indeed an excellent base for the Chelmsford Sea Cadets. It is right that the sea cadets have a different funding formula from the other two services. They receive a mix of funding from the MOD and other sources. Each sea cadet unit is an individual charity. There has been much debate over the years as to whether or not that is the right way to move forward, but I should be delighted to meet my hon. Friend.

[Sir Robert Syms]

In the past, the MOD has offered a number of bespoke packages to recruit people whose skills they need—for example, qualified doctors when the medical services have been short. Does the MOD intend to offer more bespoke packages to get people with a range of skills into the armed services?

[Mark Lancaster]

My hon. Friend makes a really interesting point. As we move forward there are different specialist skill sets that we need—cyber is an example, as well as medical services—and have to consider whether or not we should look at different models for joining the armed forces. One area that we are looking at is greater use of the reserves for those specialist skills and, equally, whether or not we should have some form of lateral entry, as we do with medical services.

EU Defence: Permanent Structured Co-operation

Robert Syms Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2018 General Committees

[The Chair]

We shall take Sir Robert Syms, for a change.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

I listened carefully to the Minister’s statement, which was extremely sensible and pragmatic. Our principle concern is as a strong supporter of NATO, but we are taking a pragmatic approach to working with our European partners to ensure that that work is complementary to, rather than competitive with, NATO. The Government’s approach is sensible and is supported by NATO, and we should bless what the Government are doing and hope that we can work out further co-operation, particularly in the industrial area, where there may be future projects in which we want to participate.

[Mark Lancaster]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. He effectively summarises the Government’s position very well. We are being pragmatic but are equally optimistic. Without repeating myself, we believe that what UK industry has offered historically and continues to offer is of mutual benefit to our partners across Europe in delivering European security, but we have red lines. We are absolutely clear that, once we leave the EU, we will maintain sovereign control of our military assets, but there is a positive way forward.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Syms Excerpts

Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ellwood]

I also saw those comments in the press. It is important to understand that LIBOR grants are there for additional facilities. The MOD has a responsibility to provide core activities. Obviously, there is a grey area between a core activity and an additional facility. I am more than happy to look at the details of what the hon. Gentleman raises, and I will write to him.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

9. What plans he has to introduce greater flexibility in the conditions of service for the armed forces.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Tobias Ellwood)]

Members will recall that the Armed Forces (Flexible Working) Bill passed its Third Reading on 29 January 2018 and has now received Royal Assent. It will allow Regular armed forces personnel to work part time for a temporary period, subject to the operational capability of the applicant’s unit.

[Sir Robert Syms]

I thank the Minister for his reply. To recruit and retain people in the armed services these days, it is important to have more flexible terms and conditions. How rapidly does he think that will happen? Will it be implemented now or in two or three months?

[Mr Ellwood]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. It is important to recognise that we need to reflect the needs and aspirations of civilian society. Flexible capability has already been introduced, and the process is ongoing. The Bill has received Royal Assent, as I mentioned, and will come into force in April 2019.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Syms Excerpts

Monday 16th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

As ever, I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Of course the Department will be robust. As I have said, we put our key defence deliverables and safety first and foremost. Although we will do what we can to promote renewables, which is a Government imperative, we must in the first instance ensure that our key deliverables and the safety of our personnel in the air and on the ground come first.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

11. Which urgent operational requirements he plans to bring into the core Ministry of Defence equipment programme.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Philip Dunne)]

The future of equipment bought through the urgent operational requirement process for operations in Afghanistan is currently being considered, with a departmental provision of £1.5 billion to support such equipment over the next 10 years. I can confirm to my hon. Friend that we have already decided to bring some 2,000 protected mobility vehicles into the core programme, including 71 Coyote, 325 Husky, 441 Jackal, 439 Mastiff, 169 Ridgback and 60 Warthog vehicles. That represents a significant increase in the Army’s protected mobility capability, which I am sure he will welcome.

[Mr Syms]

I welcome that very comprehensive answer. I am pleased that we will make the maximum use of the equipment that was purchased for Afghanistan and that the Government are determined to increase the capability of the Army in Europe. What cost implications will that have for the core equipment programme, and will it have an impact on other aspects of the programme?

[Mr Dunne]

As I said to my hon. Friend in my fairly comprehensive initial answer, we have allocated £1.5 billion, which is essentially to support the elements being brought back into the core. The original capital cost was more than £5 billion in Iraq, and, I think, £7.6 billion in Iraq and Afghanistan combined. That is of course money that has already been spent, so it is not a continuing drain on the Ministry of Defence budget.

Armed Forces Personnel

Robert Syms Excerpts

Thursday 10th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

I am not a regular contributor to such debates—not least because I am usually outranked and certainly outpensioned by half the people who speak—although they are very important. I was in the Combined Cadet Force in the 1970s and my main contribution was trying to avoid carrying the Bren gun over the Brecon Beacons whenever we were on exercises.

My constituency has some very proud associations with the military—for example, with the Rifles in the Army and with HMS Cattistock, which is one of our minesweepers; its skills are admired by all, including the US navy. Indeed, we have a Royal Marines base in Poole, where the Special Boat Service is based. That service includes some of the most professional and admired specialists in the world.

Like many hon. Members here, I will be attending a Remembrance day ceremony in Poole park. I have done so more times than I care to remember. In my early years as a Member of Parliament, it was clear that the vast majority of people at the ceremony were world war two veterans, although some people had done national service and there was the odd person who had served in Northern Ireland.

What has changed is the number of young families turning up with photographs of fathers or mothers who have been killed in action. That has been the biggest change during my time in Parliament and it makes me think very carefully about the decisions we, as politicians, make about war and peace, and life and death, because people have to deal with the consequences of the United Kingdom’s policy. Given longevity, some of the youngsters who have lost fathers may well be around for another 70, 80 or 90 years—long after we have gone. Our legacy must be not only to support the military covenant, but to ensure that we look after those families who have lost a loved one. We must provide the best possible support we can to our armed services, which we all value so much.

Service accommodation is a very important issue. Over the past few years, there has been a great effort to improve the standard of all housing in the United Kingdom. A lot of money was spent on council housing to bring homes up to the decent homes standard. Yet much service accommodation remains not that good. I have had many conversations with the wives of Royal Marines in Poole, some of whom work as nurses or health visitors. They often say that when they visit people on benefits in Poole, their housing conditions are substantially better than those of some of the people in the Special Boat Service. Many have often said that they are a little ashamed to ask people back to their home because the standard is not very good.

I understand, as I think we all do, the economic situation that our country is in and the fact we have to make economies. However, as soon as money becomes available, we need to invest in providing decent housing standards for the families of people in the armed services. When we commit people, as we have done in the past, to 12 months in Afghanistan, we want them to be able to leave their families in a home we would all be proud of. Therefore, much work needs to be done on that matter.

[Mr Arbuthnot]

One of the problems that my hon. Friend highlights is that the armed forces are the only people who have to compete for funding in terms of their housing and the provision of weapons to keep them alive. It is not easy to work out how to resolve that dilemma.

[Mr Syms]

My right hon. Friend makes a good point; of course, he is very experienced in this area. That raises the question of whether another organisation should be supplying the housing instead of the Ministry of Defence. Having looked at the resources made available to Poole Housing Partnership, which deals with the several thousand council houses that we have in Poole, it is clear that it could easily maintain and upgrade the hundreds of MOD houses if there were some kind of tie-up or support. We need to think rather more creatively about how we can channel the resources that are available. The hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) made a powerful point about a case in his constituency of homes on two sides of the road, some of which are being done up with public money and some of which are not, because their funding happens to come out of different pockets. It should not be beyond the wit and wisdom of our country to find a way through this.

It is terribly important that we understand the angst of service families who leave the service having been unable to buy a home because they have been serving in different areas, and so have to go on the social housing list and then find that they cannot be allocated housing. I hope that changes made at the end of the time of the previous Government and under this Government will make that somewhat easier. Most ex-military people should be at the top of the housing queue, not at the bottom. My general view of what has been happening with my constituents suggests that there is now a much better understanding of that, and that housing authorities are much more willing to find accommodation for them.

We all know about the difficulties there have been with people who are in combat one minute and getting on a jet to fly back to the United Kingdom the next. Within a day or two of being in combat, they have to adjust to being home. I am pleased that this country has done a lot more as regards the military hospitals and mental health back-up needed for the people in our armed services. I was also pleased to hear what has been said about resources to help service families and their children in relation to education.

We seem to be finding our way to a far more holistic approach towards support for the various aspects of the lives of those in the military. Certainly, there is a much better understanding of the importance of our military. Like many Members, I am sure that when I am in Poole park on Sunday for our usual parade, many more people than we saw years ago will turn out to commemorate service personnel. There is much more public support for the military. We must maintain that support for, and investment in, these very brave and exceptional people. As has been said, the United Kingdom armed forces are second to none; they do our country proud. We must invest in them and their families, and I hope that this debate plays some small part in progressing that.

The Army and RAF Lyneham

Robert Syms Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

I rise to support my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray), who has campaigned assiduously for Lyneham and for investment in his constituency. I was born in Chippenham and, like my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen), I grew up in north Wiltshire. I therefore feel that I should make a brief contribution to support my hon. Friend and say that the key factor about RAF Lyneham is how much support it has had from local communities.

Lyneham, with its Hercules fleet, generates a lot of noise but precious few complaints. I lived in the area during the Falklands war, when lots of Chinook helicopters were ferrying supplies at all times of the day. Local people show great support for the RAF, and the RAF has been a good neighbour. Indeed, some of the biggest arguments that I have seen at local parish councils concern whose turn it is to go to the open day at Lyneham and perhaps get a trip in an aircraft. People value the connection with Lyneham, which is an important point for the future.

[Mr Gray]

I thank my hon. Friend for being here to speak in support of this debate. He is absolutely right. In my 14 years as a Member of Parliament for Lyneham, I do not remember a single letter of complaint from any constituent. There was one exception when a clay pigeon shoot was being held too near the wire—we had it moved—but with regard to military activity, I cannot remember a single complaint.

[Mr Syms]

That certainly reinforces my point that north Wiltshire and the military have had a close relationship. As my hon. Friend has said, Lyneham is a tremendous asset, given its sporting facilities and existing housing. I do not know what condition it is in—the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Thomas Docherty) made a good point about the state of the defence estate; we must ensure that our armed service personnel have good-quality homes—but it is a material factor.

Lyneham is not only a good base for deploying units from Germany on military grounds, because we should pay attention to what is good for armed service personnel’s families. There are homes near the base, but there are also a wide range of homes in the community for those who wish to buy. It is an RAF tradition for people to live in all the communities around the base including not only Swindon, but Chippenham, Calne, Wootton Bassett and Malmesbury—a lot of personnel have become part of local communities. North Wiltshire is an incredibly good place to live. It is conveniently located for the training grounds on Salisbury plain and in south Wales. I consider it a no-brainer to use Lyneham for a good military purpose.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chippenham (Duncan Hames) made the good point that, with the RAF going, a swift decision is sensible, so that we can make use of this tremendous asset and locate the military somewhere that they can train and base their families, with good-quality schools and education and a supportive community. That would be a good decision for the MOD, serving personnel and their families and the people of north Wiltshire, who have done a lot to support the military and will continue to do so.