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Defence in the World

The fleet is going down to 25 ships. Spending a fortune on replacing the boats—the terminology for the submarines—will have implications for the Royal Navy budget. I want to end—[Interruption.] Is my friend the Member for North Durham (Mr. Jones) listening? I do not know how much it would cost to replace Trident because although I have tabled parliamentary questions about it, I am waiting for the answers to come through the pipeline. The Library has just published an excellent paper, which I would recommend to all hon. Members. It is called ““Trident and the future of the British Nuclear Deterrent”” and it tells us that Trident cost more than £9 billion—that is £9,000 million—at 1991 costs. If we go down that road again, another staggering sum of money that we cannot afford will be expended. It is a matter not only of Trident, but of something much more prosaic that we have all grown up with—the nuclear weapons establishment in Aldermaston. Since 2000—only five years ago—it has cost us £1.5 billion, as the Library paper tells us. If people knew that, they would be marching again today. That is my view and I hope that the Prime Minister is listening—not just today, but subsequently. That is my contribution to the start of our debate. I hope that we can have an open debate, that the Government can be serious rather than just going through the motions and that we can secure in due course a cogent response to the points that I have made.