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Trident

I poke fun because there has been so much inconsistency in this debate, but even the hon. Gentleman would have to concede that the Scottish National party has been rock-solid consistent in its opposition to nuclear weapons throughout the history both of the party and of nuclear weapons. In a world of 200 nations, 10 of which are nuclear powers and 190 of which are not, I would like an independent Scotland to be one of the 190, not one of the 10. The desultory argument that has been made is that unless we have nuclear weapons, we will be threatened. If the former Foreign Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind), for whom I have great respect, had been the Defence Minister of the state of Iran, he could have put forward exactly the same argument: ““We will be threatened unless we acquire a nuclear deterrent.”” It was said earlier by the Conservative Front-Bench spokesman that we should understand why the state of Israel requires nuclear weapons, but that is against every international agreement. Every country in the world could say, ““We are under threat, we require nuclear weapons.”” The path on which that argument would set us is not to 10 countries having nuclear weapons, but—given their declining cost—to 100 or 150 having nuclear weapons. Do we really think that in those circumstances, any form of international agreement would stop a nuclear exchange? It is really important that we try to exert whatever moral force we can towards the de-escalation of the nuclear threat. My point about the Prime Minister is that he said that there was a serious risk of Scottish independence. We believe that it is a fantastic opportunity, but if it is a serious risk, why do people want to put their nuclear weapons in a country that could shortly be independent? Is that really a risk that this House would like to take? I can tell the House that this is something up with which the people of Scotland will not put. Surely in those circumstances the safe course of action for the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea, now that he no longer sits for a Scottish constituency, would be to advocate that the replacement of the weapons system be sited on the River Thames, as opposed to the River Clyde. Unless people can accept the risk in their own community and unless they can recognise that arguments for proliferation could apply to every country in the world, they will take us down the road not of mutually assured destruction, but of certain destruction, from the proliferation of nuclear weapons.