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Recruitment (Ethnic Minorities)
6. Mr. Fabian Hamilton (Leeds, North-East): What targets his Department has set for increasing recruitment among Britain's ethnic minorities. [61342]
The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mr. Doug Henderson): Recruiting goals for this financial year are for 2 per cent. of all new recruits for each service to be from the ethnic communities. Those goals will rise annually by one percentage point until reaching 5 per cent. by financial year 2001-02.
Mr. Hamilton: I thank my hon. Friend for his response. I realise that these are--rightly--demanding targets, but can he tell me what progress is being made towards their achievement?
Mr. Henderson: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this important question. I can tell him that a comprehensive recruitment strategy is in place, involving the targeting of communities in which there are greater possibilities of increasing the number of black, Asian and other ethnic recruits. I am pleased to say that that strategy is already showing results. During 1997-98, there was an increase from below 1 per cent. to 1.3 per cent., and between April and September this year the figure increased to 1.8 per cent.
Mr. Edward Garnier (Harborough): How does the Minister intend to retain those recruits once they are in the forces?
Mr. Henderson: I thank the hon. and learned Gentleman for his helpful contribution. We must try to retain black, Asian and other ethnic recruits in the same way as we retain other recruits: through valuing their contribution to the defence of the nation, looking after them well and trying to improve the conditions in which they operate. The same applies to black, Asian and other ethnic recruits as applies to everyone else.
We must also ensure the provision of an environment that is free of harassment and discrimination. That will be crucial not only to retaining the confidence of those who are already in the services, but to attracting others from those communities to them.
Military Training (National Parks)
7. Mr. Anthony Steen (Totnes): If he will discuss with his EU counterparts military training in national parks and other environmentally protected areas. [61343]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. John Spellar): We have no immediate plans to discuss military training in national parks and other environmentally protected areas with EU counterparts, but environmental considerations are always taken into account in planning training.
Mr. Steen: Why is it that no other European country ruins its areas of outstanding natural beauty by allowing live firing by the military? Is the Minister aware that, on Dartmoor, we allow live firing on three ranges, which, in effect, closes the northern, most beautiful and highest part of the national park for 10 months of the year, Monday to Friday? Does he agree that it would make better sense to concentrate the Army's firepower at Willsworthy, where millions of pounds-worth of Government money have already been spent, and which is only spasmodically used, rather than allow live firing across the three ranges? The activities could be concentrated in one spot so as to allow the public to enjoy the national park for the purposes for which it was set up.
Mr. Spellar: I fear that the hon. Gentleman is confusing two issues. Areas of outstanding natural beauty that are within our areas of military training are retained better than those where there is widespread public
access--indeed, in many areas with sites of special scientific interest, we work extremely well with conservation bodies and we have commendations from them. We have to get that balance right and we attempt to achieve that. The hon. Gentleman should try to separate the two issues. We look at what we can do to improve access, but, in terms of the conservation and preservation of some outstanding areas and many areas of biological diversity, we have a good record, of which we should be proud.
Mr. Robert Key (Salisbury): As changes announced in the strategic defence review have materially affected the case put to the inspector at the public inquiry into the Otterburn range improvements in Northumberland national park, when will the Government decide whether to reopen that inquiry? If they do, will the Minister give a categorical assurance that the Army's military training programme will be unimpeded?
Mr. Spellar: I do not accept that the SDR changes the Army's case. Indeed, there is a strong case for the AS90. That is the one that we presented to the inquiry. The inspector in charge of the inquiry is considering whether those other matters should be taken into account, but our basic case for extending use of the AS90 at Otterburn stands and is sustainable within its own terms. We hope that the case that we have made will carry the day and enable that important training to take place there.
Dry Dock Facilities (South America)
8. Mr. Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham): What discussions he has had with the Chilean Government about the future availability of dry dock facilities to Royal Navy vessels in south America. [61344]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. John Spellar): My colleagues and I have had no discussions with the Chilean Government about the future availability of dry-dock facilities to Royal Navy vessels in south America.
Mr. Loughton: That was short and sweet, but is the Minister not aware that, in 1994, HMS Brazen ran aground in the south Atlantic, was rescued by the Chilean navy stationed at Punta Arenas and was afforded repair facilities in a Chilean dock? How confident is he that similar help will be on offer from Chile to the many royal naval and merchant navy vessels that serve in the south Atlantic? Failing that, what alternative arrangements has his Department been discussing with other south American countries?
Mr. Spellar: We do not have great ranges of agreement throughout the world about dry-dock facilities. We have ad hoc arrangements, dealt with under the normal arrangements between countries and, particularly, between navies, which are obviously concerned if a vessel of another fleet is in distress. The good relations that we have with our Chilean counterparts--
Mr. Spellar: The good defence relations that we have with our Chilean counterparts will continue. We have no evidence to the contrary.
Mr. Ian Davidson (Glasgow, Pollok): Is the Minister aware that, after using any Chilean dry dock, the ships
involved would be required to undertake sea trials, and that sea trials are the only sort of Chilean trial that we believe would be impartially conducted?
Mr. Spellar: My hon. Friend ingeniously tries to tempt me into an area in which the Home Secretary has a quasi-judicial capacity and on which I should not be tempted further.
European Defence Review
9. Dr. Jenny Tonge (Richmond Park): What plans his Department has to promote a European defence review. [61345]
14. Dr. Vincent Cable (Twickenham):
If he will make a statement on his recent discussions on common European defence. [61352]
The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. George Robertson):
We have invited our partners and allies to join us in thinking afresh about how to strengthen both European defence capabilities and the European Union's common foreign and security policy. The initiative has been very positively received, and I look forward to continuing the discussions with my colleagues in the coming months. The agreement of a statement of principles at the British-French summit last week was an important step forward.
Dr. Tonge:
Does the Secretary of State think that--despite the Prime Minister's speech at the North Atlantic Assembly and talks with the French a few days ago at St. Malo--there should have been some mention of the matter in the defence review, so that hon. Members could have debated the overall issue of European foreign policy and defence? Is it not time that that policy was debated in the House before it is announced to the press? Is the Secretary of State happy that the Prime Minister is talking to the French but has apparently not approached other European partners?
Mr. Robertson:
That is absolutely wrong. We are talking about a call for fresh thinking and not a major revision of British defence policy. A week ago last Friday, the House had a debate on the Queen's Speech that touched on those issues. We have made it absolutely clear that we are talking about a fresh look at the way in which Europe might take quicker, better and more effective decisions on a European defence capability that will be built on several key principles: no question of a European single army; no Commission or European Parliament involvement in decision making; no transfer of decision making on military capabilities from individual Governments; and no undermining or duplication of NATO. Surely, especially after Kosovo, this is a time for Europe to recognise that perhaps we should be thinking much more clearly about how, in certain circumstances, Europe might act, should act or might have to act without the United States of America, and about building our capability so that, if we do so decide, we shall really be able to do it.
Dr. Cable:
Will the Secretary of State include nuclear defence in the list of exclusions that he has just given the House? Does he agree that this might be an appropriate
Mr. Robertson:
If the hon. Gentlemen will examine the strategic defence review and the very significant and radical suggestions on the nuclear front that it contains for implementation, he will see that, some time ago, we took on board the very ideas that he is expressing. When it makes sense for us to co-ordinate with other nuclear powers, we shall do so. How we can contribute to the general debate on arms control and disarmament is a matter of primary importance to the Government, which is why certain moves were made within the strategic defence review itself.
Beyond the nuclear forces issue is the bigger and more immediate issue of how Europe as a whole will configure its forces--perhaps in the way that we completed our strategic defence review--and face the fact that the threats of tomorrow perhaps require more modern thinking about how decisions will be taken, and more modern forces to deal with those threats.
Mr. Barry Jones (Alyn and Deeside):
May I remind my right hon. Friend, in supporting his European approach, that there is news in today's edition of The Times that delivery of the 25 C130J Hercules aircraft that have been ordered is now two years behind schedule? Was he not therefore very wise to indicate in his strategic defence review that he had not closed the door on the heavy-lift future large aircraft project? May I tell him that, if he does go forward with the project, he will find that my 3,700 constituents at the Broughton factory will not only make the wings of a future large aircraft on time but will acknowledge him as a fine Secretary of State?
Mr. Robertson:
I look forward, with ambition, to receiving such praise. I again compliment my hon. Friend on the articulate and forceful way in which he promotes the interests of his constituents and his constituency. He is right to point out the inordinate, unreasonable and, I believe, disgraceful delay in delivery of the C130Js. I have taken up the matter at the very highest reaches within that company. It is one of my inherited delayed programmes, but I intend to ensure that British taxpayers get value. Similarly, on future strategic lift, the idea--perhaps even more than the idea--of a future large aircraft produced in Europe is well among our plans.
Mr. John Maples (Stratford-on-Avon):
Can the Secretary of State confirm that the Prime Minister said in his North Atlantic Assembly speech that the European Union needs genuine military operational capability and that, on Friday, the British and French Governments signed an agreement stating that
Mr. Robertson:
No, the Prime Minister did not. Under the Maastricht treaty, which was signed by the previous Government, we moved towards the idea of European common defence. Under the previous Government, at the time of the Berlin summit--when Michael Portillo stood at this Dispatch Box--they set out to create a European security and defence identity inside the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. The European Union, under the Amsterdam treaty, has access via the Western European Union to the capabilities being built up in the European security and defence identity.
I, the Prime Minister and many people in this country of common sense are saying that, if we are to have that existing framework and structure, the button pressed by the EU through the common foreign and security policy surely has to connect promptly, and with military effectiveness, with the capability inside NATO. We have no intention of replicating or duplicating NATO assets--the structures are there. At issue is how Europe should use the assets that are at present available to the maximum effect.
Mr. Maples:
That was the answer to a different question, because I quoted exactly what the Prime Minister said after Amsterdam. The proposal is exactly the same as the one put forward then by the French and the Germans. I know that the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister are not consulting each other on this matter, because while the Prime Minister made that statement in an interview with The Times, the Secretary of State was telling the House in the strategic defence review debate that that development would take place entirely within NATO, and re-established and restated the Amsterdam position.
Conservative Members wholly support the maximum Anglo-French defence co-operation, but within NATO. Can the Secretary of State explain how an EU capacity for the autonomous use of military forces can possibly be both autonomous and within NATO?
Mr. Robertson:
If it uses the European security and defence identity component--the forces that are designed to be in place for use by Europe and can be triggered through the EU via the WEU. We are talking about the same thing. We are not in any way undermining NATO--indeed, we are strengthening it.
Perhaps this is a fortuitous moment: instead of the hon. Gentleman getting deeper and deeper into the Europhobic swamp in which his party seems to like swimming, may I inform him and the House that, today, the British contribution to the NATO extraction force in Macedonia is beginning its deployment? It will consist of a company from the King's Own Royal Border Regiment, equipped with Warrior infantry fighting vehicles. The company will be deployed for six months, and in the initial stages will be supported by a squadron of Royal Engineers and other troops.
The extraction force will be largely European led. British, French, German and Dutch troops will operate inside the NATO command structure in precisely the way
that we would have intended. The House will join me in wishing our troops and their families well in the job that they are going to do.
Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith (Wealden):
With great respect, the right hon. Gentleman has got it all wrong. He sends confusing signals. What is required is not fresh thinking, but action. We have the structures. Is he aware that the Western European Union already embraces the nations that contribute to Atlantic defence? France is not an integrated member of the command structure. The European Union contains large numbers of neutral states. Rather than confusing us with rhetoric, would it not be better to talk about the WEU as the separable but not separate arm of NATO?
Mr. Robertson:
The right hon. Gentleman should listen carefully to what is said. The Western European Union can act on the suggestion of the European Union and access the European security and defence identity components of NATO. All that the British Government are saying--although our thinking is quite radical--is that we need fresh ideas on the connections between the European Union's determination of common foreign policy positions and its ability to access the existing NATO European security and defence identity resources.
By streamlining the process and concentrating on building European capabilities instead of European rhetoric, we shall strengthen NATO and Europe's ability to access military resources as effectively as possible in situations that Europe might have to face.
Mr. Crispin Blunt (Reigate):
A year ago, the right hon. Gentleman and the Minister for the Armed Forces, who was then a Minister at the Foreign Office, preened themselves on coming to the House having secured a protocol on NATO in the treaty of Amsterdam. Many Conservative Members, including me, congratulated them on that achievement. That protocol contains a request for the Western European Union to come up with proposals on exactly what the right hon. Gentleman is talking about. Either the Prime Minister is gulling us with a load of waffle about nothing or there is a substantive change under way to what the Government agreed less than a year ago.
Mr. Robertson:
This is a real storm in a Europhobe teacup. Conservative Members must get to grips with the fact that this Government secured the first ever mention of NATO in a European treaty. We are concentrating on making that work. How can the European Union, with its reinforced common foreign and security policy, get together the capability to ensure that when Europe wants or needs to act militarily and the United States does not want to get engaged, we can do so quickly, safely and effectively? My announcement on the extraction force to be based in Skopje in Macedonia shows that it is common sense to ensure that we have the proper capabilities in Europe and streamlined structures to ensure that action follows decisions.
"the EU must have the capacity for autonomous action, backed by credible military forces and the means to decide to use them"?
7 Dec 1998 : Column 10
After the Amsterdam summit last year, did the Prime Minister not describe exactly those proposals as
What has happened to change his mind?
"an ill-judged Franco-German transplant operation"?
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