Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what positive outcomes they can report from the 3rd International Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons which they attended in Vienna.

The UK’s participation in the Conference was welcomed by many states, non-governmental organisations and parliamentarians. At the Conference, officials listened carefully to the participants, who expressed a very wide range of views. Some argued that the way to achieve the goal of a world without nuclear weapons was to ban weapons now or to fix a timetable for their elimination. This approach fails to take account of the stability and security which nuclear weapons can help to secure. None of us would gain from a loss of that stability. The UK believes that the UN Disarmament Machinery and the Non-Proliferation Treaty provide the right forum for working towards a world without nuclear weapons.

Our Ambassador to Austria restated our concern at the humanitarian consequences which could result from the use of nuclear weapons. That is why the UK works extremely hard to prevent the use of nuclear weapons; to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons; and to keep our own nuclear weapons safe and secure. We are also committed to working towards a world without nuclear weapons. In our Strategic Defence and Security Review in 2010, the Government undertook to reduce the number of warheads we have by the mid-2020s. However, we shall retain a continuous submarine based deterrent, for as long as the global security situation makes it necessary.

A copy of the UK intervention at the Conference has been placed in the Library of the House and is attached to this response.