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Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I suspect that the House is beginning to forget who is addressing it. These remarks are very interesting and I know that the question needs answering, but the Minister will remember that he is intervening.
Mr. Spellar: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
For that reason, the programme will be on time and within budget, as far as we can ascertain. It will deliver that capability, once we have the work done. That happens in upgrade programmes regularly.
Mr. Davies:
The Minister is entirely to blame for last week's media outcry. Had he volunteered that information to the House, as he should have done, there would have
Mr. Thomas Graham (West Renfrewshire)
rose--
Mr. Davies:
I am being generous, but I shall give way. Then I must press on.
Mr. Graham:
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. I was interested in the point that he made about sending letters to the Ministry of Defence and not receiving a reply. As the Member of Parliament for West Renfrewshire, I represent Bishopton royal ordnance factory. I am sick and tired of writing letters to arrange a meeting to which Ministers do not reply. The Minister told me last week that I would have a meeting. It has been a full week since then, and hundreds of workers in Scotland still face the dole. Enough is enough. It is time that the MOD replied speedily to Members' letters.
Mr. Davies:
We could hardly have had a more revealing intervention than that.
I shall move on to other procurement programmes that have not yet been the subject of a press outcry, but perhaps they should be. We may get some clear answers this afternoon--but maybe not. One of them is the TRACER programme. It is said that the United States has withdrawn from that programme. Is that correct? If so, where does that leave the TRACER project? Will we proceed with it ourselves, and if so, what will the incremental cost be? If not, what will we do about a new generation reconnaissance vehicle? What are the Government's plans?
This is an extremely important matter and, once again, Ministers are reluctant to give Parliament the facts and to give an account of themselves as they are required to do in a parliamentary system. We shall draw our own conclusions from the fact that the Minister is not leaping to his feet now to give me an answer.
What about BROACH? Will the Minister confirm that Lockheed Martin have been awarded a contract for the penetrating warhead for the US air force air-to-air cruise missile system, despite a 1998 memorandum of understanding with the Department of Defence that made it clear that British Aerospace was the preferred contractor? Is that true? [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Savidge) seems to think that this is extremely funny. He seems to think that military procurement, the waste of taxpayers' money and the question whether all these elaborate promises in the document are a lot of eyewash are funny. I suppose that he is one of these new Labour politicians who think that one can survive on a diet of spin doctoring. I remind the hon. Gentleman that this is a serious matter. We are discussing the future of our defence forces and the circumstances in which men and women wearing uniform will be exposed and at risk of their lives in combat.
Mr. Hancock:
On the question of spin, I am interested in the spin that the hon. Gentleman attempted to put on the SA80. Is he aware that, in 1993, section and platoon
Mr. Davies:
We know perfectly well that, when the Government are really in trouble, their Liberal Democrat allies try to come to their rescue. That was a completely irrelevant intervention. I have already stated that that weapon had a number of problems that the Conservative Government addressed. In any case, even if that were not so, it is irrelevant to the responsibility that the present Government bear for the armed services of the nation and for the equipment procurement programme. If the Government wanted to argue that this was such a hopeless weapon that it should be junked, they could have done so when they came to power. Instead, they not only took over the programme, but they have gone round saying that this is a capable weapon. They believe in it, but the troops in the field clearly do not.
Mr. Roger Casale (Wimbledon):
Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Davies:
No, I shall not give way at the moment.
New Labour and its Liberal Democrat allies may not want me to talk about BROACH, but I intend to do so. Is it true that a contract has been awarded to Lockheed Martin in breach of a memorandum of understanding with this country? Is it true that the performance specification was reduced at the last moment by Boeing and the Department of Defence to allow the Lockheed Martin weapon to compete? British Aerospace had, in good faith, been working for years on a more sophisticated double-stage warhead. It that true, or is it not?
Is it true that the Government themselves are so upset and humiliated that they have instructed Sir Robert Walmsley and our ambassador in Washington, Sir Christopher Mayer, to protest? They have not told Parliament about it, but apparently they are instructing our ambassador in Washington to make a great fuss. If it is true that we have been treated in this fashion, where does that leave the much-trumpeted agreement signed in Munich by the Secretary of State for Defence and the Department of Defence? Is it not worth the paper on which it is written, or is it a legally binding obligation on the United States Administration? Has it been ratified by that Administration? Has it been ratified by Congress? Let us have some answers on BROACH.
I could speak about a good many other procurement programmes, but I shall deal with just one: the joint strike fighter programme. I can see that the Minister for the Armed Forces is not enjoying this; he is trying to engage in a completely artificial conversation with his neighbour, the Under-Secretary of State, in the hope of getting out of answering my questions.
The joint strike fighter programme is extremely important. There is a rumour abroad that, although we shall be sharing the full range of our vertical take-off and landing and very short take-off and landing technology with the Americans, they will not be sharing the full range of their stealth technology for the aircraft with us, and the aircraft made available to us will therefore be stealthed to a lesser degree. In other words, our aircraft will be less effective, and our pilots more vulnerable, than their American counterparts. Is that correct, or is it not?
I warn the Minister that, if that is really the line that the Government intend to pursue, such invidious discrimination would be an obnoxious, humiliating and unacceptable solution.
Mr. St. Aubyn:
I am listening to all the questions that my hon. Friend is asking, to which he is receiving no answers. Is he aware that, like the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire (Mr. Graham), I wrote to the Ministry more than three months ago about a company in my constituency and its attempts to bid for a tender for a contract. I have still received no more than an acknowledgement from the Minister and his Department. Is that not yet another example of the way in which none of our complaints are treated seriously?
I cannot judge the cost to the Ministry, but I know that the contractor that it has chosen is charging more than £500 for each of the plastic straps, while my constituency company would charge only 54p. That is how lacking in smartness the Ministry's procurement programme is.
Mr. Davies:
That was another revealing intervention, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for it.
Providing a firm foundation for national defence, which the Government have promised to do, means being absolutely clear about the key strategic issues of the future. Last Tuesday--and, indeed, in Defence questions--my hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) made it plain that the Government do not know where they are going in regard to anti-ballistic missile defence. That is extraordinary, for a host of reasons. One is that this is one of the great issues of the moment; another is that we may be implicated directly in any United States ABM defence programme because of the Fylingdales facility. The third is that, most extraordinarily, the Secretary of State actually said during Defence questions on Monday:
the criticisms were carefully investigated. It was concluded that stoppages were largely attributable to incorrect maintenance . . . Some units had not been employing the correct lubrication and cleaning procedures.
The hon. Gentleman and the Conservative Government accepted that cleaning materials were responsible for the gun going wrong. Is he seriously telling us that all the blame is now on the Labour Government's shoulders? That cannot be right.
the United States Administration have made it clear that one of the specific considerations that they will take into account--
in relation to ABM defence--
is the reaction and attitude of the allies.--[Official Report, 21 February 2000; Vol. 344, c. 1224.]
President Chirac has made absolutely clear where he stands on the issue, as was pointed out last week by my hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green. The Government seem incapable of doing the same.
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