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Defence Industrial Strategy

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his remarks and I hope that the opportunity for such a debate arises. A defence debate is coming up early in the new year and Members may want to make representations about the topic of that debate. I would welcome our building a cross-party consensus on this issue. In a way, I regard the defence industrial strategy as a parallel of the strategic defence review, which I had the honour to oversee in 1997–98. It constituted a thorough review of the operational capabilities, configuration and direction of our armed forces, and I hope that this strategy proves similarly effective. There will be plenty of opportunities for scrutiny by, for example, the National Audit Office and Parliament, and the right hon. Member for North-East Hampshire (Mr. Arbuthnot)—he is with us today—who presides over the Defence Committee, will doubtless take an interest in this issue and in the project itself. The difficulty lies not in that but in getting the balance right between what we open up to competition, and what we maintain here as a strategic and sovereign requirement. I welcome all contributions to the debate on that issue, because I genuinely believe that it is not a party political one.