Government Announcements

Stuart Anderson Excerpts

Monday 2nd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Powell]

If we were not doing a statement today, I would agree with the hon. Member, but we are doing a statement on the strategic defence review. The review is 150 pages long and will be laid before the House in time for the statement, as is usual practice. There were trails of the statement ahead of time—during recess, on the Sunday—but the full document and conclusions will be laid before this House, as I have said. I am sorry that members of the media were given advance sight of it—as I understand, it was in a closed reading room—but publication of the report will be to this House this afternoon.

[Stuart Anderson (South Shropshire) (Con)]

To read about our nuclear defence strategy over the weekend, ahead of the SDR, is quite alarming—just as it is to see this morning that journalists have received all the information and the Opposition still have not had sight of it. The Leader of the House is saying that she is speaking to No. 10 and Cabinet members about the importance of this matter, but did she raise concerns over the weekend when she saw the leaks in the paper?

[Lucy Powell]

Some aspects of the SDR were trailed ahead of time, but not the one to which the hon. Gentleman refers; that was not something that the Government were designing to put into the public domain over the weekend. That is normal practice these days. I know we all like to speak about a time when we just did things when the House was sitting, but things are sometimes given to the media ahead of time, although not the nuclear issue that the hon. Gentleman is talking about. We will have a further urgent question on that, and we will have the full strategic defence review statement shortly, at which he can ask the Secretary of State for Defence a question.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

I call Stuart Anderson.

[Stuart Anderson (South Shropshire) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Is there any way we can have a list of the commercial companies who have had sight of the review ahead of anybody else, because commercially sensitive decisions might be made that impact the defence industry and give people a market advantage?

[Mr Speaker]

You make the point that I was hinting at before. I am very concerned that people who have skin in the game may be able to take advantage of what is in the report. I hope that no trading has been done on the back of it, because that would be a real concern. I find it quite appalling that Members still do not have the report. The Leader of the House could, if she wishes, suggest that we allow the report, so that Members have the chance to read it. It is totally out of order that we know the report is sat there and could have been made available, but nobody has been given the chance to read it. Rather than my suspending the House—time is tight—people could go and collect a copy of the report now, and could be reading it before the next urgent question. Does the Leader of the House agree?