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Defence in the UK

I could not agree more. Given that 50 per cent. of the entire naval married quarters are in the Portsmouth area, that would be a very real problem. The people serving on ships to whom I spoke said that if they had to move up to Scotland or down to Plymouth, they would leave the Navy. I am saying nothing to denigrate Scotland or Plymouth, but merely expressing the view of the people living in the Portsmouth area to whom I spoke. In the Trident debate we discussed an amendment that advocated a delay in decision making, and my worry was that some hon. Members seemed to think that it was a risk-free option—a way of putting off a difficult decision. That seemed to me then, and it seems to me now, to demonstrate a misunderstanding of the process of defence procurement and the time scales involved. The latest possible in-service date for the Vanguard submarines is 2024, and we heard that that is already extending their life by five years. In my view, that is risky in itself, but we did not hear too much about it in the debate. The latest expert advice suggests that it will take 17 years to design, build and deploy a new submarine, and it does not take an arithmetical genius to work back and say that we need to start work on the new design in 2007.