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Nuclear Disarmament

My Lords, I know the whole House is grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, for initiating this very timely debate. I thank all noble Lords who have participated for their contributions, and for emphasising the need to make further progress with nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. The noble Lord, Lord Addington, made a very poignant point about how it felt in the past. I remember reading Bertrand Russell’s Has Man a Future? when I was still in school and being terrified by his account of how he saw things. A number of critical issues have been raised by noble Lords, including the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea,; the possible proliferation risks generated by the wider development of civil nuclear energy; the inadequate security of fissile material around the world; fears over regional security, particularly in the Middle East; and the perception that the nuclear weapons states are slow to implement their existing disarmament obligations. That is a great list of very difficult and challenging issues. I will answer some of the points raised in the debate, and later make some of the points which I will not have covered. Each of the concerns that have been raised is justified; together they are compelling. Therefore, I reaffirm to the House that the Government recognise the importance of these challenges to world peace and security, and fully agree that nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation are among the most important and pressing issues of our time. As the noble Lord, Lord King, has said, the risks of inaction are enormous. As the House will know, the UK is fully committed to the ultimate goal of a world without nuclear weapons. It is strongly committed to securing multilateral action to that end, and I confirm that to the number of noble Lords who raised the issue. This debate very usefully addresses the prospects for multilateral nuclear disarmament and for strengthening nuclear non-proliferation. As others have said, those prospects are now more promising than they have been for years, not least because the advances of 2009 and the opportunities of 2010 give cause for realistic hope and spur us on to work further and harder. Last year, as several noble Lords have observed, the UK Government were active in influencing others and pushing non-proliferation up the international agenda. We published Lifting the Nuclear Shadow, to which the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, referred, which set out the conditions for abolishing nuclear weapons, and in the summer the Prime Minister launched The Road to 2010, which set out the UK’s position ahead of the NPT Review Conference. In addition to the words and directions, as the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said, the Government hosted the International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Conference and an historic P5 conference on confidence-building measures towards nuclear disarmament; worked to establish the UK Nuclear Centre of Excellence; and continued pioneering work with Norway and the NGO, VERTIC, on the science of warhead dismantlement verification—an important aspect of what has been discussed today. The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, and other noble Lords have been right to draw attention to the fact that this year brings significant opportunities to secure further advances in nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. In the setting of 2010 and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, we hope for an announcement soon on a successor to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty between the US and Russia, and we await the outcome of the US Nuclear Posture Review, which will establish US nuclear deterrence policy, strategy and force posture for the next five to 10 years. Several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark, talked about the NPT review conference and what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, has called a "renaissance of multilateral … disarmament". That requires the strengthening and reinvigorating of the NPT. We want a balanced action plan across the three pillars to give us a road map for nuclear weapons build-down and increased global security. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, that we will seek a political commitment by NPT partners at the review conference to make progress towards universal adherence to the additional protocol. Working with partners from across the international community, I confirm to the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, and others our commitment to a multilateral approach. We will consequently seek a mandate to make the existing non-proliferation regime more effective through improvements in safeguards, in verification and in compliance measures. I should also say to the noble Lords, Lord Hannay and Lord Lee, that we fully agree that countries should not cut and run from the NPT. We will also continue our work to establish viable mechanisms to ensure safe and secure access for all NPT parties to the benefits of civil nuclear energy, provided that they fully comply with their non-proliferation obligations. The IAEA board of governors recently gave wide support for that approach, and noted the importance of developing a range of options for assurances of supply. Several noble Lords asked about the US. I confirm that it will host a nuclear security summit in April that will help to promote common understanding of the threat of nuclear terrorism and seek to build international support for effective means of countering that threat. I assure noble Lords that the Government hope to contribute to the success of that conference, which we accept is basic to security. Let me turn to some of the other points that have been made in the debate which I have not covered. We welcome the ICNND report, which the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, mentioned. We have no plans to adapt it as a White Paper, but we will carefully consider how we can best make use of its proposals. On IAEA funding, there will be a donors’ meeting later this year to discuss the financial resources that the agency needs to meet the challenges that it faces. The noble Lord, Lord Lee of Trafford, talked about strengthening the NPT. We see the NPT as the cornerstone of our non-proliferation and disarmament policy. It has never been more relevant to take this option very seriously. The Road to 2010 sets out detailed proposals for a balanced and pragmatic strengthening of the NPT. The question of a disarmament laboratory was discussed. As I said, the UK hosted a P5 confidence-building meeting in September 2000. I alluded earlier to our ground-breaking work with Norway on that important work of verifying warhead dismantlement on the road to zero. A number of noble Lords raised the issue of future sanctions. It is clear that sanctions have had some impact, but not enough to change the course of Iran’s nuclear activities. We now need multilateral sanctions that will affect decision-makers in the region, with the aim of bringing Iran to productive and sensible dialogue. We are in regular dialogue with the E3+3 to achieve this, but cannot, I regret, put a timetable on it at this time. We will therefore consider tightening and extending to other sectors sanctions that target the regime. The noble Lords, Lord Patten of Barnes, Lord Anderson and Lord Howell, also touched on Iran and sanctions. The EU has implemented UN sanctions and has gone beyond them by freezing the assets of more entities in Iran, including Bank Melli, by banning more officials from travelling from Iran and by imposing further requirements on Iranian banks. That is a significant addition to what we have. My noble friend Lord Judd, the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Bramall, and others talked about Trident. The decision taken by Parliament on the 2006 White Paper is consistent with the NPT and with the long-term goal of achieving a world free from nuclear weapons. It does not mean that we are irrevocably committed to retaining nuclear weapons for the next 50 years. I reassure my noble friend Lord Judd that, when it is useful to do so, we will willingly include the UK’s nuclear weapons in a future multilateral disarmament negotiation. On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Owen, the 2006 White Paper considered a range of options and concluded that retaining submarine-based systems is the most effective way of proceeding at this time. We found that no alternative could match the capability or the cost that were considering. Continuous at-sea deterrence, to which the noble Lord, Lord Howell, referred, is currently provided by four submarines. On 24 September, the Prime Minister announced his intention that from the mid-2020s we will meet our minimum requirement for three next-generation submarines, provided that this is consistent with credible and continuous deterrence. Work is in progress on this and other issues. The noble Lord, Lord Patten of Barnes, and others referred to China. We understand that the Chinese Government recently put legislation before their National People’s Congress on this, and we need to encourage China to move towards ratification as quickly as possible. I should say to the noble Lord, Lord King, the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, and others that we communicate regularly on issues of nuclear safety and security in Pakistan, and we help to fund work to ensure nuclear security through the International Atomic Energy Agency’s nuclear security fund, to which we are one of the largest contributors. The noble Lords, Lord Hannay, Lord Hunt of Chesterton, Lord Giddens and Lord Addington, the noble Viscount, Lord Waverley, and others talked about the global expansion of nuclear energy. It is the Government’s conviction that we will not overcome the twin challenges of climate change and the security of the energy supply, which is necessary for sustainable development, without wider use of nuclear energy. However, there is a need to ensure that the long-term development of civil nuclear power takes place in a culture of openness, transparency and confidence. This can be achieved by strengthening the IAEA safeguards regime, and by encouraging multilateral and regional approaches to the nuclear fuel cycle. To that end, we remain fully committed to the multilateral approach agenda and we are working on steps within our UK-led nuclear fuel assurance proposal. We regret North Korea’s withdrawal from the six-party talks and hope that it will re-engage. We are seriously concerned about its claim that it has restarted plutonium production to develop its highly enriched uranium programme. In our contacts with the North Korean Government, we have urged them to re-engage with the international community and to comply with their NPT obligations. In my effort to address as many points as possible, I am sure that there are a number I have not. We will go through Hansard to make sure that noble Lords who have not had an adequate response will receive a letter from me. To conclude, the road to zero is long. The 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference and other events this year are milestones. They are not the destination. While our attention is rightly focused on making them a success and on reassuring our citizens that we take our obligations seriously, we also have to look beyond this horizon. It is our common responsibility to ensure that the proliferation of nuclear weapons does not set back the cause of nuclear disarmament, nor imperil the role that international nuclear co-operation should play in combating climate change, ensuring sustainable development and the development of nuclear energy for non-power purposes. The multilateral aspect of these efforts is crucial. As my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary has said, we must find common cause and move from a decade of deadlock to a decade of decision.