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Defence Procurement

I apologise to the House, to the Minister for the Armed Forces and to my hon. Friend the Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) for missing most of the opening speeches. As the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy) mentioned, she, the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Jones) and I were at a meeting to discuss coroners inquests and that is why we were delayed. I decided to change the habit of a lifetime today by not concentrating on specific defence procurement issues that might affect my constituency and instead taking a broader view of defence procurement and why we need to do it at all. I should like to explain why, if I were Prime Minister, I would wish to double the defence budget over 10 years. Of course, that will not happen under any Government, but I should like to explain why we sometimes need to take a step back and think about why we have defence procurement at all. Is it a question of boys' toys or something rather more serious? During the summer, I attended the funeral of a distinguished former war correspondent from the second world war, latterly a great expert on Nelson, who was the author of more than 20 books. One of those books was drawn to my attention, and I read it during the recess. This remarkable book, which is called ““East and West of Suez: the Retreat from Empire””, was written by Tom Pocock in 1986. It talks of the great days of the British Navy and the 1953 Spithead review. He talks about the celebrations that took place:"““Foremost among them was to be the traditional naval review at Spithead off Portsmouth, when, tricked out with fluttering bunting and burnished brass and to the sound of bugles and saluting guns, the British displayed the realities of power. Two hundred warships of the Royal Navy lay at anchor, including the beautiful battleship Vanguard and seven aircraft carriers, while three hundred naval aircraft waited at airfields ashore to fly overhead as the royal yacht steamed between the long lines of grey ships.””" He then points out that there was a lot of fighting between the defence chiefs:"““the Board of Admiralty was demanding a yet more generous share of the defence budget for research and development, aircraft production and ship-building. This brought them into conflict with the Air Council which was bidding for a force of long-range jet-powered bombers to drop the atomic bombs which were now being delivered to the RAF. The air marshals were allowed their bombers, which were to be called the Valiant, the Victor and the Vulcan and, collectively, the V-bombers, but the admirals were disappointed. True, eight aircraft carriers were under construction but work was proceeding slowly on three cruisers, which had been laid down about ten years before, and the Admiralty maintained that at least seventeen were needed.””" Some might say those were the days, but the only reason why those things happened was that the British public—the electors—knew that they needed such a scale of armament and those procurement programmes. We seem to have forgotten all that in the intervening years. We tend to think of high-intensity conflict as a very important subject, but we do not actually think of what is needed. After all, the traditional reasons for going to war have changed dramatically. We are not looking after territorial advantage now, or aiming for territorial expansion. We are not setting up new empires around the world. We are far more interested in acquiring armoured vehicles, guns or aircraft—platforms, as we must now call them—and systems to go with them because we are more interested in homeland defence and security. We are no longer concerned with the threat of invading armies; we are more interested in cyber warfare. Peace enforcement is a crucial part of the operation of the forces, as is guarding against terrorism, and deterring and defeating it. However, there is also the matter of our country's need for global trade and travel. That is what we have done for hundreds of years, it is a legacy of empire and Commonwealth, and it is very important today. Owing to the fact that 90 per cent. of our trade is carried out by ship, we need a long reach to protect that trade.