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Armed Forces (Modernisation)

I think that I covered that point earlier—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack) is a respected Member of the House. I treat him with the same respect with which he treats me, and I will seek to give him an answer. It was intended that there should be written ministerial statements today— Patience! Just calm down. Those statements would be augmented by briefing in the normal way that goes on right across government—[Interruption.] When the Conservatives were in government, they did exactly the same in terms of putting information into the media. That is the right and proper way to disseminate information. The first responsibility of the Government is to give the information to the House, and that is what we did in the written statements.