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Iraq

I respect the hon. Gentleman’s views on these matters because of his experience in, and contribution to, our armed forces. He regularly engages with me on such issues and knows my commitment to ensuring that we live up to the undertaking of giving our commanders what they need to do the job on the ground. He also knows the advances that we have made in the past 12 months on getting additional protected vehicles in place, especially in southern Iraq. However, the experience of the attack on the Warrior makes it very clear that the type of device that is being deployed against our forces is such that it is unthinkable that we could find an armoured vehicle that would stand against that and with which we could do a job. As he knows, this is about not just vehicles, but tactics, intelligence and other operational requirements. As events over the weekend have shown, all those things have improved exceptionally in Basra. Our troops there are literally fighting back against the risks with significant success.