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HMS Tireless

I shall try to answer as many of the hon. Gentleman's questions as I can. The report took 15 months to complete. We have been everywhere in the effort to understand the detail of what happened. When I first approached the matter without knowing the detail, I wondered why it was taking so long and I was worried about the impact on the families. We went all the way, however, and even involved NASA—these vessels and the expertise associated with them are associated with the space programme—in order to understand all the ramifications. In the circumstances, I am sure that everyone would agree that thoroughness was more important than timeliness, although it is indeed unfortunate that these things take as long as they do. We struggled to make contact with the families, and it took longer than it should have done. Record keeping was part of the difficulty. None the less, that does not excuse the media behaving as they did. I wish that they always honoured—they often do—our kin-informing processes. We should all encourage them to do so, not only because of the distress caused to the individuals concerned, but because of the worry caused to the whole of the rest of the fleet in this case, or to our people on operations in other cases. On whether the vessel was in any danger, I am assured that it was not, but that does not detract from the fact that the conflagration could have been far worse had it not been for the actions of one particular individual. As I said, he was injured at the time, yet he struggled on and did a magnificent job. He has not been named because the wishes of that individual must be paramount over the views of anybody else. It is up to the individual himself how he wants to handle this. The problem was not, contrary to what has been reported, the jamming of the bulkhead door; it was another door into the compartment that jammed and took 40-odd minutes to get open. That door has been replaced by a mesh door, which will now be rolled out throughout the fleet. The board of inquiry exposed other issues about the adequacy of the equipment on board to break into the compartment in an emergency. That is being looked at and the recommendations are being implemented. On whether there are other combustibles, I cannot give the hon. Gentleman an answer. I will look into it and come back to him as soon as I am able. On whether the SCOGs were beyond their sell-by date, they have a 15-year life expectancy and the Navy imposes a 10-year life expectancy in order to put some redundancy into the position. These SCOGs were introduced only in 2003, so the sell-by date of the equipment is not an issue here, although I have said yes about other serious issues. Stowage on board submarines was one of the issues flagged up. The generators for emergency use are stowed in different circumstances in different conditions and are not moved on and off submarines, so they are in good condition. As I have already said, they were all inspected. The generators used to add to the oxygen requirements, however, are routinely removed from submarines and have not been stowed on submarines where they would be safe from contamination from oil. There were issues about the handling of the bodies which have caused great distress to the families concerned. I do not wish to go into further detail on that, although there are lessons to be learned. I have discussed the matter privately, as has the Chief of the Naval Staff, with the families.