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9.28 pm
Mr. Lindsay Hoyle (Chorley): I should like quickly to deal with contracts and the need for jobs. The short-term heavy lift project is extremely important in that context.
The Antonov 124-100 would allow a £300 million saving, which could be used to fund the important contract for the BVRAAM system. We hope that a part of that contract will include the Meteor, which is important to constituents across the United Kingdom. The jobs that would be involved in the Meteor programme are crucial. If the programme does not proceed on an indigenous, European basis, we shall not only lose the expertise of those constituents, but be beholden to the Americans for ever. It is therefore important that the Meteor programme is favoured by the Government. I hope that Ministers will take on board that point.
The A400M is another very important contract. We are seven years away from delivery of that aircraft, which involves 62,000 jobs across the United Kingdom. The expertise necessary for the project has been used successfully within Airbus Industrie, and it could be transferred to a military use. The crucial factor is not the 62,000 jobs created by the A400M project, but
the project's technology spin-offs, including wing technology, which could be used for the next generation of Airbus. The technology is crucial if we are to compete with the Americans and the giant size of the competing American company. If we do not back good old British procurement now, we shall really be beholden, once and for ever, to the Americans. There is nothing wrong in using the Americans, but there is a danger of losing our expertise.
I look forward to our two aircraft carriers being big enough to use Eurofighter, as otherwise we will be struggling, especially if all the other projects go out of the window. It is crucial to ensure that the carriers can take all our serving aircraft.
Mr. Robert Key (Salisbury):
Many tributes have been paid to my honourable and gallant neighbour, Michael Colvin, and his wife. Because he was my constituency neighbour, I would like to add mine. Almost everything has been said that could be said, but I want to add one thing. We grieve, but there is something else: Michael and Nichola were just such fun. We should not forget that. With his unfailing courtesy, generosity, chivalry and cheerfulness in adversity, he was beholden to no man and to one woman: Nichola.
In all my nearly 17 years in the House, I have never known such concern and bewilderment about what is going on in defence. We have even managed to attract the attention of the tabloid press. That is unheard of for defence, in which matters normally swim along. This is not the short-term political bickering that the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, North (Mr. Henderson) said it was.
I thank the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) who, with his usual courtesy in following the conventions of the House, sent me a telephone message to say that he is not here because his wife is in hospital. We wish her well.
I accept that there has been huge progress in embracing changes and challenges. There have been challenges and changes in the ministerial team, too. The new Under-Secretary is very welcome to our debates, as is the Secretary of State. Will they measure up to their predecessors in the affection of Her Majesty's forces? Indeed, will they measure up to the warm affection and respect in which the Minister for the Armed Forces is held throughout the armed forces?
The Defence Committee, of which I was a member for some years, has produced a devastating report--one of the most hard-hitting of a hard-hitting series--overseen by the hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George). It was so extraordinary that we will vote against the motion. We will do so in support of our armed forces, of their families, who follow the flag, and of thousands of scientific, industrial and administrative civil servants. We will do it as a warning to the Government that, in the strategic defence review, they raised great expectations--as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames) said--that they are failing to deliver.
This is not party political bickering--there remains strong cross-party consensus on the importance of defence in the nation's affairs--but it would be a dereliction of our duty if the Opposition failed to say that enough is enough. We are not alone, as we have seen in the Select Committee report.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) set the tone by speaking of the gravity of the defence situation and the fact that the position is unsustainable. As the hon. Member for Hereford (Mr. Keetch) said in his excellent speech, we face an extraordinary situation in that there has been no progress report on the strategic defence review. I hope that he will have the courage of his convictions and vote with us.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex used all his experience and passion in his excellent speech, expressing the doubts that a growing number of people have.
The hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) spoke about his concerns. I am delighted that he will be serving on the Standing Committee considering the Armed Forces Discipline Bill. I shall be there too and I look forward to hearing his contribution. I look forward to seeing him at Tidworth on Saturday at the RAF wives conference--the airwaves conference. We shall have to work hard because, once again, there will be no Minister present in support of the RAF wives.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson) has come to a judgment on a number of procurement issues. He has that luxury on the Back Benches. It is impossible for an Opposition Front-Bench team to come to a judgment on a procurement issue, because we know neither the financial details nor the security implications. However, we are fully briefed. We are delighted that we are kept on our toes by the remarkable British, north American and other defence procurement interests.
My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) saved me a great deal of time with his comments, particularly about asymmetric threats and chemical and biological weapons. I should like to echo his comments and amplify them slightly. The strategic defence review had just two paragraphs--numbers 101 and 102--on the subject. The joint nuclear, biological and chemical regiment has its headquarters at Winterbourne Gunner but is stationed at Honnington. We hoped that the document, on "Defending against the threat from biological and chemical weapons", would say something exciting, but it did not. It was another relaunch, taking the art of spin to new levels. It had 49 new words. It said that spending would be increased from £70 million to £80 million a year, but other than that there was nothing new in the glossy brochure.
I shall not embarrass Ministers by listing the detailed deficiencies in the system, but it is not joined-up government. There is no tasking between the Ministry of Defence and the Home Office. There are no secure communications between Honnington and Winterbourne Gunner. There is very little logistic support. Then, of course, there was the letter from Land Command to all commanding officers saying that chemical and biological weapons training at Porton Down was too expensive, so they should go elsewhere and fudge it on the cheap. The Government are neglecting our home defence and we have rumbled them. They should not be proud of that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mr. Hunter) spoke with clarity and passion about the situation in Northern Ireland. I agree strongly with him. My hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth) spoke about the declining defence budget and particularly about the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency, the headquarters of which is in his constituency. It is crucial to the success and safety of our armed forces. The longer that the Government dither, the greater the number of questions that will arise and the fewer answers there will be.
The argument is moving backwards. DERA was a privatisation too far for the Conservative Government, largely on security grounds. We now have Lord Robertson's legacy--a £250 million promise to the Treasury that is putting at risk all that DERA stands for. Will we have a research DERA with a core function and 3,000 or 4,000 people plus a privatised DERA with 8,000 or 9,000 people? It is not that simple, as Ministers must realise. Just one example of that is at Boscombe Down. DERA's testing organisation is not a research body. Its purpose is to establish the fitness and airworthiness of military aircraft and systems, but it is facing three showstoppers. First, it cannot privatise without resolving the status of its military airfield. A public-private partnership implies new income, presumably from civil aircraft, but Boscombe Down is exempt from the air navigation orders. The second showstopper is that, whether the future of the organisation is public or private, there will be a need for a minimum investment of £150 million for new aircraft and systems, without which it cannot do its duty.
The third and by far the most important showstopper is that the testing organisation is currently working on the C130J, the Chinook and the Apache. Once again, the issue raises our relations with the United States. The 1,100 people at Boscombe Down include 180 uniformed personnel, who are at the cutting edge of flying operations. They are tightly integrated into trials teams. That raises two points. First, this is a military airfield, with military aviators and engineers. Secondly, it is imperative that there continues to be unfettered access to sensitive United States military and industrial bases. It is hard to see how that can be achieved under private ownership.
My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury also raised the question of families. I have never known forces families to be so angry. Normally, they follow the flag, they are quiet and they dislike disturbing the chain of command. They are loyal and they look after their own folk. So why, despite policy for people, has so much upset been caused to loyal groups such as the Army Families Federation, which is now becoming known as "Army Families Furious"?
A recent report from the federation stated:
Then there is the question of the substantial improvement in the number of recruits. Last week, the Secretary of State told the House that the Government
As if that were not enough, we find the following chilling and terrible indictment in the report by the Select Committee on Defence on the Ministry of Defence's annual reporting cycle:
There appears to be considerable ignorance at the level of the top decision makers of the strength of feeling that any further cuts in the Defence Housing Executive future funding would create among service personnel and their families. Every possible effort must be made to minimise the irreparable damage that this ignorance is doing to the morale of service personnel and their families wishing to live accompanied.
If Ministers are sore about that, they should remember that I am merely the messenger. It is the Government who have the problem. However, we shall vote against this
White Paper for other reasons too. A new doctrine is creeping into the Ministry of Defence. When the Secretary of State was considering the compulsory mobilisation of the Territorial Army to sustain peace support operations in the Balkans, he received advice from civil servants that included advice on funding. He was told:
The additional cost of the mobilisation of the engineering and logistics squadron would be of the order of £3.5 million, for which no provision exists at present. This is, however, one of the elements in the package of proposals aimed at alleviating the effect of overstretch on the armed forces currently being discussed with the Treasury. Any decision to mobilise would have to be dependent on agreement by the Treasury to meet the additional costs involved.
I have asked around and discovered that this is the first time that a Government considering putting troops into action have said, "First we must ask the Treasury." That is a dangerous new doctrine.
anticipate that full complement in the Army would be achieved by 2005.--[Official Report, 22 February 2000; Vol. 344, c. 1397.]
That appeared to be good news, but unfortunately, in another paper, the Army's head of personnel advised that it was more likely that full complement for the Army would be achieved only in 31 years. Whom do we believe?
The cumulative evidence of cancelled exercises, delayed equipment programmes and of resources apparently insufficient to reverse the problems of overstretch and undermanning suggest that if the wheels have not yet come of the SDR they are certainly beginning to wobble alarmingly. The Department's finances should be rebalanced in the current Spending Review. Commitments and resources have to be brought back into line or we risk finding ourselves stumbling from one crisis to the next.
That is why the Opposition will not support the White Paper tonight, and why we accuse the Government of a dereliction of duty. The Government might score a majority among Labour Members, but they will find that a lot of people are asking questions about their competence to run the Ministry of Defence and to conduct the future defence of this country.
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