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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 1168-ii House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE DEFENCE COMMITTEE
ministry of defence annual report and accounts 2007-08
Evidence heard in Public Questions 129 - 188
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Defence Committee on Members present Mr James Arbuthnot, in the Chair Mr David S Borrow Mr David Crausby Linda Gilroy Mr Mike Hancock Mr Dai Havard Mr Adam Holloway Mr Bernard Jenkin Mr Brian Jenkins Robert Key John Smith ________________ Memoranda submitted by the Ministry of Defence
Examination of Witness Witness: Mr John Hutton MP, Secretary of State for Defence, gave evidence. Q129 Chairman: Secretary of State, welcome to the Committee. You have appeared before the Committee before jointly with the foreign secretary but this is the first of your appearances in front of the Committee just yourself alone and you are most welcome. I have to say that I always think that the inquiry we do into the Report and Accounts is probably the most difficult one for the witnesses to deal with because we can and do cover everything across the board. For you to be faced with this inquiry within your first month as secretary of state does not mean that we will be kind to you, but we recognise the Herculean nature of the task that you are faced with. As it is your first appearance in front of the Committee talking in a general sense, I wonder if I could ask you please to give us a general idea of what your own personal priorities are likely to be in your new department over the next 12 months. How are we to judge you? The division has given you about 15 minutes' warning of what it is you are going to be facing. I will adjourn the Committee. The
Committee suspended from Mr Hutton: I think it is right that my focus should be on operations so my
priorities are Q130 Chairman: How will we judge whether you have succeeded? Mr Hutton: It will not just be my view, it will be the views of the military
commanders and the guys on the ground. I
understand that the Committee itself has a regular quarterly report summarising
some of the issues that arise from the deployments in Q131 Chairman: My own impression was that you made a good start with your speech on Afghanistan. Mr Hutton: That is very kind you. If
you could write to me about that it would be very welcome! Joking aside, actually it is a very serious
subject and I think it is first and foremost the responsibility of ministers
who made the decision collectively with members of the House to deploy our
forces to Q132 Chairman: The Armed Forces, as the Ministry of Defence tells us, are operating above the level for which they are resourced and structured and have been doing so for a long time. How do you intend to deal with that? What do you intend to do about it? Mr Hutton: I will try to answer that question in several bite sized
chunks. I think it is true to start with
that we have been operating outside the framework of the planning assumptions
that governed how we generate force structures and so on. That is true; everyone knows that. It has been true, actually, in each of the
last five or six years. I think it is an
amazing tribute to the men and women that we have in uniform that they have
been able to do the job that they have done and many of the other jobs we ask
them to do simultaneously as completing some of these very dangerous missions
in Q133 Chairman: I do not know whether you lie awake at nights, but if you were to lie awake at nights and you had a list of things you were worrying about, what would be at the top of it? Mr Hutton: Right now it is the safety, security and well-being of our guys in
uniform in Mr Hancock: Good afternoon, Secretary of State.
I am sure everybody in the room shares your view that we have to get the
right decision and the right solution for Q134 Chairman: I will allow that question, Secretary of State. Please give it a brief answer because I do not want to go over the ground again that we went over in the joint session with the foreign secretary. Mr Hutton: Again in the context of Q135 Mr Crausby: Secretary of State, you have taken over a department that only met in full one of its six PSA targets and even more worrying on the objective two target - be ready to respond to the tasks that might arise - that target was not met. Are you surprised by how poorly the MoD has performed against these targets? What is your initial assessment of why the MoD's performance against its PSA targets was so poor? Mr Hutton: I do not think anyone in the MoD is happy that we only fully met
one of the six PSA targets. We are not
delirious about our performance at all.
What is the best argument I can put forward today to the Committee about
that level of performance? I think it is
a pretty good one actually in the context of where we are. My view, the view of the department, the view
of the military chiefs certainly is that the overriding objective, the absolute
number one objective for the department is to successfully deploy and maintain
those deployments successfully in Q136 Mr Crausby: I think that is fair. The objective one target was met and that is a most important target. However, it is the future that we are a little bit worried about to say the least. Your permanent secretary told us last week that there may be a bit of institutional over-optimism in the MoD's forecasting of performance against its PSA targets. How will you ensure that the MoD performs better against its new Departmental Strategic Objectives (DSOs)? Mr Hutton: I take responsibility for the performance of the department and am not trying to duck that point. My ministers and I will be focussed very heavily on the PSAs in the next 12 months or so, making sure that the processes with the department are focussed on delivery of the PSAs. I think there is an obvious case, particularly in number two around equipment and the issue of personnel, readiness, recuperation, manning levels where we are very strongly focussed on seeing if we cannot make a better fist of it next year. That is not in any way a criticism of my predecessor who I think was a very fine and decent secretary of state, but I think some of these difficulties, particularly on the equipment and manning side - again it may not be the best defence but it is worth putting on the record - have concerned every minister since time immemorial in the Ministry of Defence. We have with us today a very distinguished former minister in the department and, if he was able to - I am sure he would not want to - he himself could bear testimony to how difficult some of these issues are. The other observation I would bring to this Committee today is that if there was a magic lever or wand or button to press in the department the Chairman would have found it, his predecessors would have found it; we would have found these problems solved a long time ago. The simple truth is that there is not a magic wand. We are focussed on trying to improve our performance and we are going to do the best we can over the next 12 months. Q137 Mr Crausby: The Q1 report on objective two, be ready to respond to the task that might arise, it says, "No progress - Readiness to for contingent operations declined". So the first indication of the DSO is no change really. Mr Hutton: That is absolutely true; I am not going to argue with that. Again the reason for that failure to make the
headway we would have liked there, to give the Armed Forces a greater level and
range of response capabilities, is because of our focus on Q138 Mr Jenkin: Secretary of State, you have said laudably that you want to be as honest as you possibly can be and we are not holding you personally responsible for some of the difficulties you are discovering in your department, but are you not rather shocked by some of the things you have found in your department? Mr Hutton: No, I am not shocked. I have taken a close interest in defence for a long period of time and what I discovered when I came into the department was pretty much what I expected. If I can be really straight with the Committee, the things that have surprised me are the extraordinary men and women that we have working for the Ministry and our country in the Armed Forces. I was a fan of the Armed Forces before I came into the Ministry, but I do not think there is an adjective now that I could use to describe what I feel about them today. That has surprised me; I did not think I would be as surprised by that as I was. Operationally we have some very significant challenges to face and certainly some of the detail of that I do not want to share in public today but I would be very happy to try to share more of that detail in private with the Committee. I do retain, I think, a strong sense of confidence in both operation missions and an extraordinary commitment to delivering success in the department. Q139 Mr Jenkin: Do you not feel, as many people now do feel, that first of all there has been a deliberate act by the government to leave the Ministry of Defence relatively short changed in view of the commitments it has over a period of years, a deliberate act of policy? Secondly, the government is relying on the goodwill, professionalism and dedication of our Armed Forces perhaps to an unreasonably degree. Mr Hutton: I disagree with the first part of that question. I do not believe it is a fair or reasonable criticism to make of the government. We have tried to correct the tide of previous spending on the MoD and actually turn it round so that the MoD can look forward to real ---- Q140 Mr Jenkin: The government found an extra hundred per cent more money for the health service; it has found very much less extra money for defence. Mr Hutton: Defence spending has not increased at the same rate as NHS spending
and that obviously is an aspect of decision making that we and everyone on the
government side I think can reasonably defend.
I think that is clear, given the state of spending in the National
Health Service and the state of decline that we did inherit. In the context of the Defence Department
there have been very significant increases in real term resources. I do not want to be partisan unnecessarily
today, they corrected the trend that we discovered when we came into office. Do the Armed Forces have all the resources they
would like? I think the answer to that
is no. Does any army, navy or air force
anywhere in the world have all the money and resources it wants? Probably not.
We have to make political decisions and I stand by them but I would not
characterise - I do not think it is fair to characterise - our spending
decisions as wilfully in the way you have described, to deprive the Armed
Forces of the vital resources they need.
In fact, if anything, from my experience of theatres when I have been there
- I can say this in complete honesty, I am not putting words into anyone's
mouth here - I spent the entire time in Iraq and Afghanistan trying to find
people who would say that the kit is not good enough or the equipment they have
is not good enough. I did not find many
people who said that. My understanding
is that has also been the experience of the Committee when it has been in these
theatres too. I think it is important to
have that on record. I believe that the
forces that we have deployed to Q141 Mr Jenkins: I appreciate that some of the PSAs, particularly recruit, train, motivate and retain, are composites but we have an outcome, a final assessment of "partly met". I find difficulty with "partly met". Is it 90 per cent partly met or 70 per cent partly met? Do you not think in the interests of transparency if there was a figure in there we could know that next year if that figure goes up then we are improving. "Partly met" means nothing to me. I know it is a difficult task but would you like to go away and think about whether it is possible to give us some figures so we can see what improvements and progress are being made. Mr Hutton: I will certainly go away and think about that. If there is any more information or better particulars we can provide to the Committee of course we will do that. PSA five was a complex target - it had five subsets contained within it - and we fell short in particular in two very significant areas, one is in the serving manning balance and secondly in the Harmony Guidelines. We have to improve our performance in both of those areas. I can say to the Committee, particularly in terms of service manning, that we are doing pretty well. I think the numbers coming into all three services are running at a very high level, the highest since 2004. We are seeing not just an increase in the training strength but in the numbers of those joining the regular forces coming through training. The manning balance is better for the Royal Navy, it is better for the Army, it has slightly dipped for the Royal Air Force and we need to drill down and look at some of those issues. I think we are making progress. We are not making as good progress as we should be on the Harmony Guidelines but again it comes back to the priority that we attach to the operational target. That is our priority. Q142 Chairman: Would you give consideration to Brian Jenkins' point about assessing this with figures. Mr Hutton: Yes. There are figures out there that I am sure we can reasonably share with the Committee. I would be very happy to do that if I can. Q143 John Smith: I can assess one of the target with figures. It is a target that MoD has failed year in year out for the last ten years on the recruitment of ethnic minorities. In fact the targets are nowhere near achieved. As the new Secretary of State for Defence do you think it is important that we do recruit ethnic and other cultural minorities into the Armed Forces and the British Armed Forces should reflect the society that it serves? Mr Hutton: It is absolutely important that the Army, Navy and Air Force do reflect the society it serves. I agree very strongly with that. I think the figures are going in the right direction. The target we have actually set is to be realised in 2013 and that is to get to eight per cent ethnic minority representation in the Armed Forces. At the moment it is about 6.2 per cent. The numbers are increasing but it is work that we need to continue to focus on. Q144 John Smith: You may or may not be aware, Secretary of State, given that you have not been in the post very long, but the figures you are using actually are the ethnic make up of the British Armed Forces drawing on Commonwealth recruits. The targets that were originally set after the Strategic Defence Review was the recruitment of British ethnic minorities, UK citizens. If you do have a chance to go back and have a look at that I think you will find it is an abysmal failure. We are not in the blame game in this Committee; what we aim to do is to try and address that issue. Mr Hutton: I am aware of the figures that I gave and of course the figures for
Q145 Linda Gilroy: Secretary of State, you referred just now to work in MoD headquarters and in the support and administration, however the administration of the MoD has been severely criticised by the Burton review in the wake of the serious data losses. There has also been the disastrous introduction of the JPA which was the result of poor decision making and the Cabinet Office's Capability Review concluded that there were weaknesses in the leadership of the MoD. What specific action are you going to take to improve these areas? Mr Hutton: I think the permanent secretary certainly addressed the issue of the failures of the JPA when he was before the Committee last week. I am not sure I have very much more to add to that. We have discovered a number of problems with JPA as the roll out has proceeded, not least of which some of them led to the qualification of the MoD's accounts this year which is very regrettable. I think those failures are to do with the quantum of auditable information that JPA generates which can form the basis obviously of the work of the NAO. We found that we did not focus enough attention on that. That is being addressed by the department and I hope we do not have a re-run of the qualification for that reason next year. Q146 Linda Gilroy: Does it surprise you that so little attention was paid to the way in which that would feed into the accounts? Mr Hutton: I was not familiar with the detail of JPA until about two weeks ago as I began to prepare myself for this session but yes, I think I was surprised. Hindsight is a very precious commodity in ministerial life and I am not sure it actually adds up to very much, but I think the department is looking to try to address these issues. On the data loss point I agree, I share the frustration with everyone here and outside that we continue to lose personal data; this cannot go on. We are looking very carefully now and we have done a number of studies and projects. I know people say it is time we delivered on them and it is. We have to change the culture. We have to make sure that there is responsibility when data goes missing. We have to make sure our principal contractor takes greater responsibility for security of data. Work is in hand on all of those areas to try and tighten up performances. It is simply not acceptable for this kind of data to go walkabout, in particular when it jeopardises potentially the financial security and personal security of members of the Armed Forces; they expect better from us and we have to do better in this regard. Q147 Linda Gilroy: Last week I asked the permanent secretary about recommendation 38 which is to do with organising a coherent system of censure and punishment for those who lose or compromise personal data. Is that something that you will be paying attention to to try and change the culture as you have just said? Would that include ministers if they were found wanting in that respect as well as officials? Mr Hutton: I think the permanent secretary is ultimately responsible for these matters in the department and it is his responsibility to make sure not just the sanctions and the disciplinary side of things that are appropriate, but to be perfectly honest I think the focus should be on making sure it does not happen and not dealing with the consequences when it does. I am content that the permanent secretary is taking the right measures in this regard and I am happy for him to get on and deal with it. As far as ministerial responsibility is concerned I think the Ministerial Code is very clear about this. If ministers break the law, if they do not uphold standards of public life then there are issues for a minister staying in post. One thing I have learned over the many years I have been a minister is that whether a minister stays in post or not is ultimately a matter for the prime minister not myself. I think that any minister who found him or herself in a position where there had been a serious compromise of personal data, particularly involving the Armed Forces or found him or herself in the situation where there had been a breach of the data protection laws, I think their position would be pretty untenable. Q148 Mr Hancock: Can I ask, Secretary of State, are we now close to knowing what the true cost of JPA will be? Are you able to give us an assurance that the on-going costs of maintaining, updating it and getting it to function properly are not going to seriously take much needed resources away from other elements within the MoD's budget? Mr Hutton: I am afraid I cannot give you a figure today but I am very happy to follow that up with a letter to the Committee about the costs of JPA. My understanding is that we are on top of all the difficulties associated with JPA and there are remedies in place to address the shortcomings. In the context of the resource implications I think it would probably be better if I took time to reflect on that and send a note to the Committee. Q149 Mr Hancock: That would be very helpful. Could I ask then what your opinion is on the basis of the way in which the MoD's planning assumptions are put together and how those assumptions currently interact with operational responsibilities? Is the way in which the planning assumptions are put together part of the difficulty in the MoD tending to lose out in the spending rounds when they come forward? Are you intending to change that at all? Mr Hutton: We have always got to look at the planning assumptions; we have to
keep those under review and we do. Not
wanting to restart the conversation we began with about how we all know we are
outside of that box and already have been for many, many years, maybe I could
usefully add one thing. I know Bill
Jeffrey dealt largely with this point last week as well when he talked about
the planning assumptions being designed to do exactly what they say do on the
tin, they are designed to conform levels of force structure, what forces we
need to deploy and the state of readiness of those forces. They are not designed to, as it were, provide
an absolute limit and detailed actual pattern of operational commitment. They are designed to inform those who have
the job of generating force structures and levels within the department. We have had to operate, as I said, in a
different context for many, many years and the department has been able to
expand and deal with that. As I said
earlier, it cannot do that indefinitely without some fundamental give in the
system. We have to get to a point where
the actual level of our operational deployments come back within a reasonable
spectrum. At the moment they are outside
that spectrum and they cannot go on indefinitely being outside it. I am not critical of the process; I am not in
a position to criticise that. Have we
learned lessons? I think so. However, at the end of the day, going back to
the point that Bernard made, the Ministry and the Armed Forces have to be able
to respond to the requests that we receive.
If it is Her Majesty's Government's priority that the forces deployed are
of capable size and strength in Q150 Mr Hancock: We have as a Committee. I think it came as a surprise to the majority of the Committee and a disappointment to many of us that your predecessor said he did not foresee any real radical change in those assumptions. You are new in the post, are you prepared to look again at how you actually bring operational requirements and planning assumptions closer together so they actually do reflect the true needs of the MoD in the future? Mr Hutton: I think there are some things that need to be disaggregated there. I do not think there is an easy yes/no answer to that question to be fair. As my briefing notes always consistently remind me, I am new in post so I want to take time to think about what my response to the detail of that question is. I am not going to say yes or no to that today because I have not had time to properly go into all this. I think the question about getting force structures more in line with operational requirements, how we manage the demand on the men and women of the Armed Forces, we are going to make progress on that next year. I believe that fundamentally. As I said earlier, we will be able to turn a page on getting resources, people and commitments back into line. That will not be as a result of a change in planning assumptions; that will be the result of a change in operational requirements. I have a very strong feeling, a month into this job, that that is always how it is going to be. I think you can twiddle about with the planning assumptions for a very, very long time indeed but you always have to recognise that something might happen in the world; something is going to happen to change those planning assumptions. That is the nature, I suspect, of military strategic planning here and right the way round the world. It is being able to retain that flexibility, that is the key thing, and that does underpin the planning assumptions themselves and I think successfully so. Q151 Mr Jenkin: To return to a previous theme, it has been happening in the world for the last six or seven years and I would invite you in your consideration of your new responsibilities to consider this, that in fact the foreign security strategy of the UK is very much more militarist than your defence planning assumptions allow for. Has it not got to the point where we must stop hoping year after year that there is going to be a relaxation in the tempo of military operations and we should start planning for what has been happening for a period longer than the Second World War? Mr Hutton: We do a lot of that type of thinking and planning in the department. Q152 Mr Jenkin: It needs to be beyond the department, does it not? Mr Hutton: It needs to be cross-government, I accept that. We do look at all of these things. To answer the specific question you have raised, the advice that I receive is that although our Armed Forces are stretched - as they palpably are - we are able to sustain our current level of operational deployments. That is the first thing I want to say. We are not in that sense incapable of sustaining these operations. If that were the case we would be talking in very different terms, it would be a very different sort of debate. Can we go on doing that indefinitely? As I said and I have made myself very clear, no we cannot. There will have to come a point in time, sooner rather than later, where there is a rebalancing. I think that will come next year and that will be welcome. However, I think the wider point I suspect you are hinting at is, is this time for a strategic defence review because that is essentially I think the logic of where your question is going. On that too I do not want to be drawn in any great detail today. You can try your best but you will not get me to comment in any more detail other than this, that I think, certainly in the short term, we have to make clear that we can live within our existing resources in the CSR. That is partly what the equipment examination programme is designed to help us achieve and I hope to be in a position soon to be able to make some announcements about that. Looking beyond that my perspective is this: I think we should reflect very carefully over the next few months about those issues. We need to make sure that we have the right long term agenda and perspective. I am going to consider all those points very carefully. The final point of your question, has our foreign policy become overly militaristic ----- Q153 Mr Hancock: I am just saying it is more militaristic than has been planned for; I am not saying that is wrong. Mr Hutton: That is a very important clarification because I got the sense that you thought we were using military force inappropriately. I think, again with very great respect, the bottom line is probably this, as I said a few minutes ago, that you have to be able to respond sometimes to circumstances that are outwith your planning assumptions. That is the nature of life and that is the nature of the Armed Forces. We have had to be able to do that and we have had the capability and flexibility to do that over five or six years but it is not an indefinite capability because as you rightly say - and the Committee has drawn attention to it before - we are not resourced indefinitely to do that. We will have to come to a point where there is a better balance between the resources and commitment and equipment and people. We are not in balance yet. I am no great historian on this point but I am not sure whether you would ever get consensus in the post-war period that there has been that strategic balance. I remember a defence debate under the last government where many were arguing that we did not have such a balance then. We probably do not have such a balance now but I think the important point to focus on is, as we have tried to do in this report and in my argument today to the Committee, what our forces are capable of doing when they have to do it. As I said at the beginning, that is the focus of what I want to deal with in my time as secretary of state. Q154 Chairman: Secretary of State, one thing that came out of that interesting reply was that I got the impression that when you talked about a strategic defence review you were not saying that you were opposed to the idea in principle. Are you opposed to the idea in principle or do you just want to leave that on the table for further consideration? Mr Hutton: I do not think this is the right time for it. That is what I would say. I think we need to focus on the here and now. I am content with the overall positioning of defence strategy at the moment. We have a growing resource envelope but an increasing ambition as to the areas in which we should spend it. We have to get all of that back into balance. I am not arguing for a strategic defence review now. Could I rule it out at any point in the future? Of course I cannot because I am not able to bind my successors. Q155 Mr Jenkins: With regards to all the planning assumptions and everything else we are going to do with reviewing our commitments, you used the term we should be able to get it back in the box. What if, realistically, you come to the conclusion that we cannot get it back in the box, we need to buy a bigger box. Is it not about time that as a government and a nation we faced up to the fact that we cannot put this back in the box and we need a bigger box? Mr Hutton: Again I do not want to re-run the argument about the costs of
operations because the costs of operations are in addition to the comprehensive
spending review and the accounts that we presented before the Committee and we
are debating today. Over the last few
years that has come to £10 billion of additional defence spending. I think there would be a serious problem for
the country and for the Armed Forces if the net costs of operations had to be
met from within the MoD's budget. That
would obviously be an unsustainable position but it is not where we are and we
will not be in that position. I think
the cost of operations is one thing and I am not worried about that. What I am worried about, as I tried to say
earlier, is the impact on the men and women of the Armed Forces of maintaining
that type of operational tempo. There, I
believe, we have some genuine issues to address and that is why it is very
important that there is this rebalancing.
I think next year we will be able to do a great deal of rebalancing as
the operational deployment in Q156 Linda Gilroy: As well as being concerned, rightly so, about the impact on our personnel, are you also concerned that we are at that point where the flexibility that you also set so much store on, and rightly so, begins to be at stake? I am thinking there of things like maintaining a flexibility to respond to the piracy issues in Somalia, the recent change in the posture of Russia, so things like the training that is required to maintain paratroopers, anti-submarine warfare, naval flight personnel etc and their training. Is that something that is also on your horizon to have in consideration? Mr Hutton: Yes, we have to look at all of those things. I think you have identified all the important
issues there. We have talked about the
readiness and ability to deploy for contingent operations and the PSA
timeframe, in fact we have not met the levels of deployability that we would
have liked. We were able, nonetheless,
to commit resources to the anti-piracy mission in Q157 Mr Jenkin: Secretary of State, a few minutes ago you said you had to be able to respond and yet it is your readiness targets which you are missing. The PSA target last year: not met, partly met, partly met, and this year: readiness for contingent operations declined. I sense that this is one of your priorities, to improve readiness. The DSOs that are being introduced are actually reducing the readiness of some aspects of our Armed Forces to make it easier to fit into the financial envelope. Last week Mr Woolley told us, "What we have done is reconstructed the measure to make it more realistic" and he added, "we have relaxed the required readiness state of some of our Armed Forces". Mr Hutton: Yes. Q158 Mr Jenkin: This is doing exactly what you say you should not be doing. You are not going to be in a position to respond. Mr Hutton: I think I have tried to set out the fact that we have been able to
respond when it has been necessary to provide additional forces for additional
roles. I highlighted two of them a
second ago. It is true that levels of readiness
amongst some units have been adjusted and have been relaxed, that is true. That has been happening for some time and
that is of course one of the ways that you calibrate for risk and how you match
resources to your operational priorities.
It is a judgment, not a judgment that I make - let me be quite clear
about this - but this is a judgment that my military advisors present to
us. Speculating and arguing about
whether people would like high levels of risk and readiness, I think the answer
- although I have caveated it already by saying we should not speculate - is
probably yes they would. This is
something we can turn to and address during the course of the next period as we
release some of the operational tension from the system with the draw down in Q159 Mr Jenkin: Were we faced with the need for a major civilian evacuation operation from the Balkans, for example (which is something that was exercised earlier this year) or a rogue state invading a sovereign state (something that has happened twice in my lifetime where British Armed Forces had to respond) we would simply not be able to respond. You said a little while ago that there is no magic lever but there is actually one lever which the government refuses to pull which is to increase the funding for the Armed Forces so that the resources actually match all the demands and the required readiness which the government's own defence policy says is required. Mr Hutton: We have provided significant additions for the Armed Forces and I think it is far too sweeping a generalisation to make to claim today that we would not be able to respond in a way that you have suggested we should to those kinds of major events. I would prefer, again with very great respect, to take the advice of my military commanders about that rather than a member of the Committee. The advice that I do receive and continue to receive is that although stretched the Armed Forces retain very, very capable Armed Forces. I do not doubt - partly because we have the benefit of strong strategic alliances through NATO collective security and other strategic partnerships - that we retain the ability to defend ourselves and that front and centre is the foremost responsibility ----- Q160 Mr Jenkin: With the greatest respect, Secretary of State, we all know what the defence chiefs are saying both in private and sometimes even in public about the shortage of resources for defence. Mr Hutton: Show me a quote where someone has said that the Armed Forces are not capable of defending our country. Mr Jenkin: I have not said that. Chairman: We are now going to move onto people and equipment. Q161 John Smith: In the 2007-08 Annual Report there is a very worrying trend and that is the continuing decline in satisfaction levels amongst Armed Forces personnel. Why do you think this is? What do you think you can do as Secretary of State to try to reverse that trend? Mr Hutton: I think there are signs of some modest recovery in that position. I think we have made a very real and substantial and sustained effort to try to address some of those morale issues and we have tried to do so on a number of different levels. A very important issue for morale is the kit that you are issued with and I think that will reflect the level of commitment that you yourself detect on the part of government, tax payers and everyone else to give you the tools you need to do your job properly. The level of satisfaction with kit is rising. I think the set of proposals, the 40 measures that I referred to earlier, about addressing some of the recruitment and retention issues in the round have been warmly welcomed. Levels of personal satisfaction in the Army, Navy and Air Force are actually at very high levels. It is the highest level I have ever seen in any department I have worked with. There is an 80 per cent pride in the job and so on; I wish there were other parts of government where we saw that kind of score in attitudinal service. I have worked in departments where the figures are definitely on the wrong side of that line. Q162 John Smith: A factor that comes up repeatedly is the X-factor pay and we wonder if you have any plans to increase that. Mr Hutton: These are ultimately matters that the Armed Forces Pay Review Body looks at every four or five years. It was adjusted last year and I think it was increased by a factor of ten per cent which made a very significant difference to the overall headline figure of the pay in the Armed Forces. It is right that the Armed Forces Pay Review Body should look at the X-factor. We try very hard in the evidence we give and the resources we provide to be in a position to respond to the recommendations of the Armed Forces Pay Review Body in the full which we have been able to do in recent years. I think the X-factor, complicated methodology, very important that there is such a factor adjustment in armed services pay. I think it will be two or three years before the X-factor is looked at again by the Armed Forces Pay Review Body. Q163 Mr Borrow: Are you concerned about value for money so far as the MoD is concerned and also about the level of equipment our Armed Forces have? You mentioned earlier your recognition in terms of equipment and you felt that that perception was wrong, but I got a hint from an earlier reply that you recognise things need to be done on the value for money front. I wonder what you feel needs to be done to change public perception in terms of the overall efficiency and effectiveness of the Ministry of Defence. Mr Hutton: We have to deliver more equipment on time, we have to deliver more equipment on budget and we have to meet more of the key user requirements that the chiefs and services have for those items of equipment. We are focussed on trying to improve performance in all of those areas. The new commercial director in the department has brought a wealth of private sector expertise and experience into play and I think it is important that that happens. I think on the other side of that coin - there are always two sides to that coin - one thing that has struck me, looking at the range of equipment issues in the last month or so, is that it is right that we focus on value for money and the CSR settlement has imposed a very substantial set of facility disciplines on the department to improve value for money: five per cent efficiency gains that have to be done year on year. We have to generate those savings in order to get the resources that we think we need. We have plans to reduce the admin costs and overheads, reductions in the head office and so on. However, the other side of that coin - I think we should never lose sight of it if we can avoid doing so - is that the equipment we buy for the Armed Forces (although some equipment programmes have been beset with difficulties) in terms of capability is significantly an improvement on what it is replacing. The Type 42/Type 45 debate I think is a classic example of that where Type 45s are a league above and beyond the capability and range of the Type 42s. I think therefore we need greater utility, we need better value out of the assets that we are acquiring but I think the department in many respects has a good reputation when it comes to exploiting technological advantage and providing the Armed Forces with some very, very capable bits of kit. I do not think we should lose sight of that as we ponder over the nuances of the argument about value for money and defence inflation. Q164 Mr Borrow: Would you refute the arguments that some make that the MoD should not have consideration for British industry and the need to buy bits of kit and large pieces of equipment within the UK both from a strategic and industrial point of view and should simply be prepared to buy off the shelves from whoever is the cheapest supplier of a particular kit? Mr Hutton: I think the Defence Industrial Strategy which we published a few
years ago has answered that question very clearly. We have to strike the right balance in all of
this. I think the British defence
industry can and does provide equipment and products of inestimable value for
British Armed Forces. I think we should
do everything we can to help sustain sovereign defence capabilities in a number
of very critical areas. The Defence
Industrial Strategy tried to set those out.
I think it is a balance we have to strike here. We must retain the ability to equip and
provide the vital kit that we need from within our own defence industrial base
if we are going to retain essential sovereignty in defence policy. I think there is a balance here but I think
it is very important that we see the whole picture. We have to see the defence industrial
base. Of course a successful defence
base here in the Q165 Mr Borrow: On the public's perception in terms of our military capabilities, there have been quite a large number of high profile calls in the last 12 months for an increase in defence expenditure. Would you recognise that there is a danger that unless public support for the military is maintained to ensure that there is sufficient resources for the MoD to do the job that it is expected to do that will become more and more difficult to sustain particularly at a time when there are pressures on other areas of public expenditure? Mr Hutton: It could and that is why we have to avoid it happening. My personal perception is that the level of
support for the British Armed Forces has probably never been higher than it is today
in my lifetime. That, I think, is in
direct relation to the operational deployments.
There are still people who dispute the deployment to Q166 Mr Borrow: Which would be the top priorities for the department in implementing the recommendations of the National Recognition of our Armed Forces report? Mr Hutton: I think very recently the Minister for the Armed Forces set out how we are going to take the Recognition Study forward. I know there are many Committee members here who have taken part in some of these parades, for example, and they are pretty moving occasions. I think we can help sustain confidence and support the Armed Forces by doing that and other things. I think the public love to see the Armed Forces out on the streets with the drums and the flags and the bayonets. The more we do of that the better. Q167 Chairman: You mentioned the Defence Industrial Strategy. Who within your department owns that Strategy and who is driving it forward? We had a real sense of who owned it when Lord Drayson was minister, who owns it now both at a ministerial level and at a level within the department? Mr Hutton: The Minister for Defence Equipment is the minister who has, as it were, day to day responsibility for the Strategy. I decided to chair the National Defence Industry Council because I am very, very interested in this work of the department. In addition to operations which I described as my focus, the equipment programme for anyone who does my job is going to be in your face day in and day out. Relations with industry are very, very important to us so I am going to be very heavily involved in this as well. Quentin has the day to day responsibility but I see myself as very, very closely involved in this as well. Q168 Mr Jenkins: If I can take you back to public perception, you were quite right, 83 per cent of our public rated our Armed Forces as best in the world. When it comes to the MoD there was a different perception and they blame the MoD for the lack of equipment. Is it just the MoD itself, is it you and the MoD, is it the political side as well? What are you going to do to start changing the public perception in regard to the equipment and how could the MoD help? Mr Hutton: I know my limitations; there is probably not a lot I can do in the short term to turn round those images and those perceptions. However, we are going to try to do what we can. One of the most important and interesting things here to consider is that I know there is a temptation to see the Ministry of Defence as this vast bureaucracy that is simply designed to try to stop things happening and make things more complicated. That is completely untrue. I think in a number of very important areas if the MoD were here and were able to blow their own trumpet there are things they can point to and look at which are very significant things that have made life different in a positive way for the Armed Forces on the front line. The urgent operational requirements have been a great success. We have converted very, very complicated equipment ideas into equipment on the ground in six months. We should learn a lesson from that for the wider equipment procurement programme. The MoD is working flat out to support our guys and it annoys me actually when people look at the MoD and say it is just a bureaucracy that gets in the way; it is not. The other thing I would say about the MoD - all of you will know this because you are very closely involved in all of this - is that it became very clear to me on the first Wednesday I was in my department which is uniform day in the MoD, half the people had uniform on. This idea that the MoD is this sort of bureaucracy of civil servants out to trample on the Armed Forces, forget it; it is not. It is an integrated part of the Armed Forces. It needs to be as integrated as it possibly can be. I am not speaking through a sense of frustration, things happen too slowly; we are trying to address that point. I think there is more we can do. Q169 Mr Holloway: A recent article in Janes Defence Weekly says that you are trying to "bring clarity to British defence policy after a period of considerable drift and confusion" which I guess is what you have also been saying. What about how we bring clarity to the area of defence equipment? What is your main priority? You have already said that it is in terms of having the right stuff for operations but how is that going to play out? Mr Hutton: I think the equipment programme is designed to deliver the long term core capabilities that we set out both in the SDR and in subsequent white papers so it is heavily focussed on providing us with an effective expedition capacity capability, new and more modern and effective equipment for the Army, the future rapid effects system is a very important part of that. Of course for the Royal Air Force, they are in the middle of a fundamental re-equipment process. I think it will be quite difficult to remember a similar time when just about every level in the RAF and every type of equipment is going through this major programme of renewal and investment. I have not seen this article in Janes but it sounds like a good one actually. I think the clarity around the equipment programme I believe is there. It is focussed on these really important strategic long term core capabilities that will mean the ability to deploy expeditionary forces over air, land and sea to make sure our guys have the most up-to-date kit that they possibly can have. I think there is clarity around that. The frustration is about the delay but I think the equipment needs are clear. Q170 Mr Holloway: What about programmes like carriers and future rapid effects? Mr Hutton: We have been right the way round the houses on the carrier and we have brought people together on the carrier, we have committed ourselves to two carriers. We should just get on now and produce the kit. Q171 Mr Holloway: Are there any programmes that are looking like being cancelled or deferred? Mr Hutton: I am not going to comment on particular programmes because we are looking at a range of programmes in the equipment examination, but we have made a decision on a carrier. Once you have got to the point where we have on the carrier, it is time to get on and do the carrier. I think the carrier is definitely going to proceed. It is fundamental to any conception of an effective Royal Navy that I can envisage. It brings with it a whole range of other equipment priorities: anti-submarine warfare, above the air and below the sea and so on, frigates, destroyers. It comes as a package and we have to configure the Royal Navy accordingly. I do not want to speculate about individual programmes. I have said a lot about the carriers simply because that is the most obvious one to say something about. We have done the deal on the carriers and I am surprised there is still debate going on. Mr Holloway: I totally agree with what you said earlier that our Armed Forces in
Q172 Chairman: Secretary of State, could you answer that question in one minute, please, because we need to keep this under control. Mr Hutton: If I have a minute I will not be able to answer that question. Q173 Mr Holloway: Can I make it really easy for you then? In 2007 this Committee was told by General Houghton that Snatch would be withdrawn by the autumn of that year. Why is it that Snatch has still not been withdrawn completely? Is there a problem with the MoD? Mr Hutton: I have not seen General Houghton's comments on the Snatch so I do not want to get drawn into rebutting or otherwise what was said. The advice that we have consistently received is that Snatch has a role to play in operational deployments because it is a highly manoeuvrable vehicle, but it has to be deployed in the context of appreciable risks. That is why we have spent a huge amount of resource ----- Q174 Mr Holloway: Late. Mr Hutton: Over the last two years we have been redeploying Mastiff, we have
Ridgeback going in, we have Jackal going in to meet the threat. The threat has changed. We have tried to adapt our deployment to meet
a different type of threat and the threat is a very real one now from IEDs,
landmines and other very, very dangerous weapons that have been deployed
against us and our guys must have better protective vehicles. I hope by the end of next year we will have
1200 new and better armoured vehicles to deploy in theatre which I have been
advised will meet the operational needs of the theatre and we have pulled our
finger out in the way I have tried to describe to get that kit out as quickly
as possible. We have done so at a speed
and at a rate which I think it unprecedented in modern British military
history. Yes, you can point the finger
if you like, but what I do not believe is fair is to say that the MoD,
including the service chiefs and everyone involved, has not been aware of the
dangers and risks and tried to mitigate them as far as they possibly can. I have driven Snatch in Q175 Mr Holloway: Then you use helicopters. Mr Hutton: We have increased helicopters by 60 per cent. We have a 60 per cent increase in helicopter hours available for our guys and we are looking to do more. I would like to get the Merlin fleet out here as quickly as possible. John Smith: Taking up the remark about the tabloid press leading changes in medical support services, this Committee drew the opposite conclusion and in our report we pointed out just how good medical services were for our Armed Forces. My question is about equipment. There is no point in introducing 21st century equipment to the Armed Forces unless we have 21st century technical training to support that equipment. Secretary of State, will you be as committed to the defence training rationalisation programme as was your predecessor? Q176 Chairman: The correct answer is "yes". Mr Hutton: Okay, the answer is yes. Q177 Mr Havard: The question of rebalancing and particularly equipment, as we understand it and what we have been told is that there is a short examination taking place which will be conducted by Christmas. We were wondering how short was short, given that it started in the summer. Within that this rebalancing the equipment programme will obviously deal with current frontline activities but I think part of the concern we also have is how is that going to be related to recruitment given that there is so much of the money and the resources linked in with legacy policies and legacy issues. Perhaps you could make some comment about whether or not that short term equipment programme review is going to be done by Christmas and how will it inform the change of the planning assumptions that we were told were going to take place in March? Does that still apply? Mr Hutton: I think on the equipment examination it will conclude in the next few weeks. I do not want to crack a joke, but if it started in the summer and concluded by the end of the year in MoD terms that is short. I think we are getting at this as quickly as we can. As far as the point about the planning assumptions are concerned, I made it clear earlier that we continually look at what we can do, what we ought to be doing and so on. The point about recuperation you were making is a really, really important one. There is a lot of work going on in the department about this. I think this might benefit from a briefing from the vice chief of the defence staff who is leading the work on recuperation. As I said earlier, it is going to take time. We will not get back to where we want to be any time in the immediate future but I think we can start by short, small scale operations maybe as an initial focus of restoring some capability around that area. I think VCDS is probably the best person to take the Committee through a fuller briefing if that would be helpful for you. Q178 Mr Havard: I assume the Chairman will say yes to that. I think that would be a very good idea because it is clearly central to the argument about how you deal with the problem of equipping for the present and the immediate future and how you balance that against the longer term future. I could advance an argument that that is effectively by default almost, a quick and nasty strategic defence move taking place by default through these processes but we do not have time to go into that. I think what the concern is how do you actually balance the two? Clearly the UOR process (Bulldog, Mastiff, the dogs of war) that we are employing to deal with the immediate is very good but that then has implications for FRES and the future equipment programme. How do you balance the two is what we are really interested in. If the recruitment, which is clearly important in all of that, is such that we understand we are not going to be able to do large scale operations in any sensible way until 2017, then those are particularly important issues that we would like to discuss. Mr Hutton: I would probably want to challenge that last bit. Q179 Mr Havard: Good, challenge it. There is a lot of rumour about the fact that the one is prejudicing the other. Mr Hutton: I think the current scale of operations is going to change very fundamentally during the course of the next few months and I think we need to factor that in. The point you make about the relationship between the core equipment programme and the urgent operational requirements is very important. Again I do not have a quick answer to that question; it does raise pretty profound issues. We should just reflect on this one obvious fact, someone mentioned the future rapid effects system earlier and how important it is because that is an attempt to look ahead 20, 30, 40 years and give ourselves some capable platforms on which we can adapt and build. In the process of the last three years we have actually acquired 1200 new armoured vehicles and we have to be aware of the capability that that represents as well. FRES remains a fundamentally important programme for the Army. We are looking at aspects of FRES in the equipment examination at the moment, as you would expect; there is nothing outwith that. We are looking at how we can meet the needs of the Army taking into account the obvious addition to the armoured vehicles strength of the UORs. Q180 Mr Havard: Can I ask you one question in relation to this? You are quite right about the strategic defence review, it is a much longer thing. However, the Armed Forces minister in June said that the planning assumption review that was taking place which would be informed by the equipment review will be a ten year look at planning assumptions for the future. Is that still the case? Mr Hutton: I have not seen any work on the planning assumptions on that basis, no. Maybe I need to think about that. Q181 Mr Jenkin: Just before we leave Snatch, I understand you have received a letter from the solicitors representing the families of the victims, those who have died in Snatch Land Rovers, requesting that you instigate some kind of inquiry that would be beyond the scope of a coroner's inquest. Would you consider holding such an inquiry - I am not suggesting it need be a public inquiry - chaired by a senior retired armed services chief and perhaps some privy councillors taking part to demonstrate that the equipment being provided to the frontline is what we really need? There is obviously a crisis of confidence amongst many of the Armed Forces and certainly in the public about this matter. Mr Hutton: I would be prepared to look at that. I have to say, I have not had that letter drawn to my attention so I have not seen this correspondence yet. Obviously I would look very seriously at that, yes. Chairman: We will move onto the issue of Mr Holloway: Sorry, I am totally off the ball today. Where are we? Chairman: We will move further on because I think actually you have answered that question. Let us move onto the issue of NATO. Q182 Mr Hancock: The MoD hosted a formal meeting in September focussed on the modernisation of NATO. We ourselves have done a report on the future of NATO. What issues were discussed and in what ways do you believe that NATO has to change to become more efficient and more effective in what they can and what they are prepared to do? Mr Hutton: I think it has to change in two fundamental ways. It has to become far less bureaucratic because it is far too bureaucratic at the moment. I think there are over 3000 committees involved in the work of NATO. I might have added a digit to that, someone can correct me in a minute, but there are hundreds and hundreds of committees. That is just not viable. We have to streamline the headquarters function of NATO. We have to make it more effective and efficient as a planning entity. Finally I think we have to focus on perhaps the most important issue of all, we have to work with our NATO partners and allies to improve the levels of deployability of NATO forces because the nature of the new security challenge is different to the old one. I think there is precious little point in having 80 or 90 per cent of our forces positioned in static places pointing at the Russians; I do not understand that. Q183 Mr Hancock: Some of your predecessors have indicated the view that NATO partners had to change their opinion on things, particularly their willingness to share the real burden when it comes to war fighting. Are you optimistic that there is going to be a significant change within the idea that you can buy into NATO collectively but you can be selective in what you actually put your forces to as being a thing of the past and they need to be more realistic now to say that it cannot always be the same half a dozen countries who put their troops on the line time and time again? Mr Hutton: Am I optimistic? I have
attended one NATO council and I think I am going to reserve judgment about
whether I am optimistic or pessimistic about this. What I do believe very strongly is that NATO
membership brings with it some pretty full on obligations and it is not a pick
and mix menu; I do not believe that that is what NATO membership involves. On burden sharing, I think we have to respect
some important constitutional issues that some members of NATO have to carry
and work under about the extent to which operational forces can be deployed in
a context and I think we have to respect that, in which case we need other
types of help an other types of support.
There cannot be a general get out clause to do nothing. I think we have to work at this, we have to
build alliances and I think it is very important that we retain NATO unity as
we set about doing this re-organisation.
I do not think it is going to help me; it is not going to help us in Q184 Mr Hancock: Could you give us your view of what the nature and the quality of NATO's commitments to both Georgia and the Ukraine are? Mr Hutton: I think they were set out pretty clearly at Q185 Mr Hancock: Do you believe, at this moment in time, that there is a commitment from NATO to protect and look after them? Mr Hutton: Article five will extend when they become members of NATO. Q186 Mr Hancock: At the present time do you believe they are mistaken in their belief that that commitment is already there? Mr Hutton: Yes. There is no Article five commitment to countries that are not members of NATO. Q187 Linda Gilroy: What do you think the prospects are for working with EU partners to achieve better alignment of some of the capabilities to enable them to step up to the mark alongside us? Mr Hutton: I think the prospects are good and I think the Q188 Chairman: Would I be right in thinking, Secretary of State, that some of your remarks were over interpreted and what you were saying was that where Europe can add defence value that is to be welcomed? Mr Hutton: That is what I was trying to say. The other thing I have learned since I came into this job is that every word counts. I am trying to be a bit clearer today about my intentions in this regard. The questioning, as I remember it, was about the ESDP; it was not about a European army. My comments about pragmatic and looking at things that would work were in the context of the European Security and Defence Policy and not in the context of some notional argument about whether we should have a European army. Chairman: Secretary of State and to the Committee, I would like to say thank you to both of you because the Committee has been disciplined and, Secretary of State, so have you. You have come to the end before 16.18 when we are just about to have some votes. If I may diffidently say so, I thought that was an extremely impressive first outing in front of the Committee alone. There will be things no doubt that we will want to ask you questions about. I would like to end with an apology to Adam Holloway because I gave the impression that he had missed a question about helicopters when actually the person who had missed the question about helicopters was me. That is the end of the session. Thank you very much. |