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5.7 pm
Mr. Robert Key (Salisbury): Our annual two-day defence debate always generates a remarkable breadth and depth of discussion, ranging from international and strategic affairs and perspectives to the erudite examination of the merits of procurement decisions. That is all right and proper. In opening for the Opposition on the second day, my first duty is to put on the record our thanks and admiration for the dedication of the hundreds of thousands of people who are the prime asset of our nation's defence--those in uniform and in the scientific and industrial civil service, agency staff and contractors' staff.
Since 1 May, it has been said time and again by Ministers that defence was not an issue in the general election. If the Government really believe that, we are living in dangerous days. Hon. Members who take even a passing interest in defence know that defence is a live issue. Anyone travelling abroad, be it to France or to the far east, knows that defence is an issue. The United Kingdom's military will probably see more active service in the next two or three decades than in the five decades since world war two.
I shall now comment on what the Minister for the Armed Forces said about progress in research on Gulf war illness. Undoubtedly, hundreds of men and women who
fought in the Gulf are ill. They need help, which is available through their general practitioners and the wider national health service. The challenge for the medical and scientific community has been to identify a syndrome or common theme with a common cause and then, if they meet that challenge, to discover whether there is a common cure. The previous Government therefore asked the Medical Research Council to design and commission appropriate research. Ministers emphasised time and again that they had an open mind, and we must all continue to have an open mind while doctors and scientists explain to us what has happened over the years.
In the previous Parliament, the Defence Select Committee discovered serious failings in the way in which the Army had administered substances and recorded--or rather, not recorded--who had been given what, but we welcome the latest initiative to piece together that very distressing jigsaw.
People who understand freedom know that if we want peace we must prepare for war--high-intensity war. In Britain, we understand that the end of the cold war brought more, not less, instability. We know that to keep the peace in Bosnia we need the AS90 gun and the Challenger tank, as well as friendly soldiers in shirt-sleeve order and election observers.
Then there is Trident. When Labour Members were lining up to support the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, the Conservative position on Trident was solid--and so it is now. I genuinely welcome the Labour Government to this common ground of hard and realistic defence policy. They have come in from the cold, but they have not even taken off their overcoats, let alone sat down to talk about their conversion. We are a bit suspicious. Are they about to try and tiptoe out again? Will the coats that they leave behind turn out to be ours after all, returned as MOD surplus to requirement now that they have won the general election?
The Government have bought the planned extra missiles, but they are going to reduce the warheads. They have decided not to scrap the fourth Trident submarine, but we understand that they might tie her up alongside the other three. If our entire nuclear deterrent fleet is berthed, crewless and effectively mothballed, what does that say about the seriousness of our deterrent? What signals does it send about our role in the world under Labour? What does it say about the relationship between the Secretary of State for Defence and the Foreign Secretary?
In paragraph 203 of the Ministry of Defence performance report published yesterday, we read:
In paragraph 243, we read of a remarkable Royal Navy deployment, Ocean Wave:
Mr. John McWilliam (Blaydon):
I have been listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. Will he tell me, first, the Conservative party view of the non-proliferation treaty and the duty of the Government to ensure that they do not breach it and, secondly, whether any Conservative Defence Minister ever gave details at the Dispatch Box of a Trident mission?
Mr. Key:
Of course not, because it has rightly always been a matter of convention in all Governments that deployment of our nuclear deterrent remains a secret. On the first point, the hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that our position was laid out by our Defence Ministers year after year after year to the House, and our position remains as stated.
Into our homes, and into our hearts and minds, television brings not only sanitised "defence" as soaps and documentaries, but the reality of death and destruction, maiming and killing. It also brings images of peace enforcement, peacekeeping on land and sea and in the air, and the hope of millions for normality and freedom.
The world has probably understood for longer than us the value to our nation of soldiers in khaki who, in a good cause, fight and win when others fail, and can then don red tunics and gently bear a princess to her funeral before the eyes of the world. Who says now that pomp and ceremony have had their day?
Defence may not have been a party issue in Hamilton, South. I suspected that the Labour candidate who is now Secretary of State for Defence never mentioned it in his general election address because he had hoped to be Secretary of State for Scotland. I checked, and he did not mention defence in his election address. Next door, in Hamilton, North and Bellshill, I assumed that the Labour candidate's election address would be very strong on defence, because he hoped to be Secretary of State for Defence. I was wrong; the present Minister for the Armed Forces did not mention defence even in his election address.
However, defence certainly was an issue in Hampshire, North-West, as it was in the Salisbury constituency. In our constituencies, the military of all three services and all ranks did not forget that new Labour's architects and masters had fraternised with CND in the cold war years. All our constituents knew what it was like to sustain men and women who, as well as being prepared to die for their country in war, made the peacetime sacrifices of difficult, often dangerous and usually repetitive service away from home, in some obscure place, and in pursuit of what they perceived to be someone else's problem. "Overstretch" became a household word.
While Labour dithered and demonstrated, in the 1980s, Conservative policies won the day. The cold war ended. Changes in defence were inevitable. The past decade has witnessed review after review of the military. The previous Secretary of State, Michael Portillo, at last
promised a period of stability. In Westminster, one could almost hear the sigh from Salisbury plain. Last year, the Defence Select Committee, of which I was a member, produced a unanimous report declaring that, as a percentage of gross domestic product, the defence budget had reached 1930s levels and must fall no more. The names are recorded.
In the most recent general election, Labour prayed that defence would not attract the media's attention. Labour did not fool its old Labour left wingers. They held their breath long enough to win the election, but by July they had found their wind again. Of course we have not heard from them in this debate--although we may still--but we heard them over the weekend in the media. They are alive and well.
In Bosnia earlier this month, a soldier in a remote camp told me that he had just received a letter from his wife in England. She was worried sick that she would not make ends meet until he came home. Her husband explained that she was a good manager, but, like most service wives, did not have access to the charge card or credit facilities that most people now take for granted. This is certainly not a party political issue.
Did you know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that men and women serving in our forces are denied store cards by excellent establishments such as Marks and Spencer, Waitrose and many others? I only mention those because they were specifically complained of to me. I shop at both, so I hold no prejudice against them. Why does this happen? First, the credit raters classify as a bad risk a person who moves house within less than three years. That includes most service married quarters. Secondly, credit rating databases often record bad debts by address, not by occupant. On moving from one service married quarter to another, it is possible to inherit a bad address.
"Trident already provides a continuously available sub-strategic capability. This will become fully robust when Vigilant joins the operational cycle later in 1997. The four boat Trident fleet will ensure that such patrols can continue to be maintained throughout the lifetime of the Trident force."
That is what we signed up to.
"The Royal Navy embarked on a seven month deployment to the Asia Pacific region in January 1997. The deployment, known as OCEAN WAVE 97 and comprising some 20 ships, aimed to demonstrate the UK's commitment to the region, to test the Royal Navy's ability to deploy an operationally effective and self-sustaining force out of area and to underline the UK's continuing interest in promoting international peace and stability.
28 Oct 1997 : Column 736There were numerous major and minor exercises together with an array of goodwill visits to further these aims. The Task Group returned in August 1997."
That proud report will be a matter of history, never to be repeated, if the Government will not send Trident to sea and if they cut naval capabilities--perhaps even decide not to replace our three aircraft carriers. There is not much hope for consensus down that route.
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