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Defence Procurement

I am not quite sure that I follow the hon. Gentleman's last point, but I accept that this is not a new phenomenon. However, that does not make it any more acceptable that so many of the armed forces feel driven—feel driven, I repeat—to go out and do what I have described. Let me turn from boots to helicopters. I cannot conclude my contribution to this debate without mentioning them. It was a subject that was always very dear to the late Lord Tim Garden who, tragically, died in the summer. He is unable to continue to make his point, so I do it in his stead. The helicopter situation in both operational theatres is desperate. In both those theatres, they are indispensable, but there are still too few. Those that there are have restricted flying times and operational constraints that affect their support role in both medical and military missions. We need not revisit the saga of the grounded Chinooks here, but suffice it to say that it has been an absolute disgrace. Years after the Chinooks were first ordered, the same problems continue to plague them. They lack airworthiness. The forces have not had the helicopters that they need at their disposal. I will be interested to hear from the Government about their plans for the future. My hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) asked the Minister about the partnering agreement with AgustaWestland in respect of the Future Lynx programme. That, of course, has been signed and there is an anxiety that the Government may not follow it through on the scale or time scale that the armed forces need. Beyond the issue of the Future Lynx is the serious issue of what will replace the Sea Kings and Pumas—they are antiquated. Sea Kings should not be used in anything like the circumstances in which they are, years after they were built for a completely different purpose. If we are looking ahead, we must have clarity about the Government's longer-term intentions on that issue. There is a strong correlation between, on the one hand, poor equipment and vital shortages and, on the other, the toll being taken on the armed forces and the overstretch about which we are all so concerned. We have heard about the widely reported and speculated-about cuts in the naval fleet. The Government need to come to the Dispatch Box and clarify their intentions in that regard; it is simply unacceptable that such reductions in our capability should be made by what is frankly a stealth process. The Minister needs to clarify the issue. The aircraft carriers have been announced and that is welcome. The hon. Member for Chorley (Mr. Hoyle) asked me about Eurofighters, but the issue of what will fly off the aircraft carriers is a long way from being clear. It is time that the Government started to indicate what they anticipate will fly off the carriers, particularly as the joint strike fighter, which had been predominant in the Government's thinking on the issue, is itself stretching further off to the right and is certainly further to the right than the now announced and expected deployment dates for the two aircraft carriers. Whether those dates will be achieved is another issue altogether, but there is clearly a time gap between the two things. The defence industrial strategy is a brave attempt to improve our procurement processes. I am pleased that Lord Drayson is still in position and is able to try to pursue the new approach. However, it is important, in identifying head contractors and the operators with whom the Government are going to deal, that the interests of small and medium-sized companies are not forgotten. When the Government make their key decisions about suppliers for the FRES project, that should be one of the key criteria by which they should be judged. What will be the role of small and medium-sized firms in that provision? There will be other considerations, such as what capacity there will be for putting new capabilities on to the vehicles as time goes on; inevitably, whatever they were designed for initially will need to change as the years go by. Making sure that whatever is designed is capable of being adapted, changed and added on to as time goes on is vital. We have to retain knowledge and capacity in certain key industries. We need to decide which those are on the basis of national security. As has been said, there will be other instances when it will be possible to buy off the shelf elsewhere. The more that we can do that in an internationally competitive environment, with allied countries being in a position to provide options to us, the better—the better the value that we will get for the taxpayer and the better the product that we will ultimately get for our armed forces.