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Defence Policy

I am very sorry to say that the hon. Gentleman is quite right. There can be no doubt that that is the case, which is why it is essential that this spiralling debt is caught hold of right away, and the strategic defence review will have to ask some very tough questions, because by no stretch of the imagination can we afford to continue as we are. In my view, too often we seek bespoke solutions for British procurement that are out of all proportion to the size and scale of our armed forces. Some things we absolutely have to supply for ourselves, for reasons of national security. Furthermore, we need to keep supplies of some of our equipment on a national basis. Equally, and quite rightly, Members on both sides of the House are always very anxious about jobs in the defence industries. However, in some instances, our defence industries will have to, in the future, gear up far more for supplying through-life support, rather than for the design of a completely unique British solution in the first place. I can also see that there might be more scope for building under licence in the future, although past examples of that have not always been happy ones. However, I have heard Members make powerful speeches on this in the House. The hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr. Gray) made an impassioned speech along those lines in one of our debates early in the summer. Some of this is not always what everyone wants to hear—certainly not what our defence industries want to hear—and sometimes it is not even what those at the head of our armed forces want to hear. The latter are perhaps those who set us off on the wrong path of over-specifying what is needed. However, if we are to address the black hole that we have just identified and discussed, we will have to accept the logic that an Army of fewer than 100,000, an RAF of fewer than 40,000 and a Navy of fewer than 40,000 cannot have their own solutions on procurement as frequently as they have been accustomed to in the past.