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Defence in the World

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend's point, which relates to the whole issue of the future role of the Royal Navy. The aircraft carriers are central to the Navy's current adaptable role, and I cannot see in any form of future threat analysis that such adaptability would be surplus to requirements. On the future surface combatant—the Type 26, as it has now been designated, was referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, South-West (Mr. Davidson) in an earlier intervention—I hope we are coming closer to deciding what the design will be, and therefore closer to knowing whether one of the variants could be based at Devonport, where we have an important skills base not just for the nuclear deterrent but for ship repair and maintenance. Of course, we will want to put forward the argument that there is no sense in putting all our eggs in one basket as far as base-porting is concerned—and especially not in a basket such as the congested port a little further along the coastline. Recent issues associated with the availability of ships for Haiti and the Falklands demonstrate the need, over technical capability, for the numbers that the simple variant of the Type 26 could provide. It is perhaps not surprising, given that the Navy's natural habitat is the oceans that make up 70 per cent. of our globe, that the Navy should take an interest in climate change not only in terms of preparing its armed forces to work in changing climate conditions, but of anticipating the impact that climate change will have on the nature of conflict and the context in which it might occur. The Defence Committee, on which I serve, had a recent interesting briefing from Rear Admiral Morisetti, who has been appointed for a period to consider and prepare for these issues. I hope that some of the work he is doing will surface and become part of the work that feeds into the strategic defence review. Many Departments of State are signing up to the 10:10 campaign. I understand that, for instance, the Foreign Office, the Home Office, the Department for International Development and many other Departments have done so. The Secretary of State for Defence has pledged his support for the initiative and encouraged individual sites to sign up, but so far only the Royal School of Signals has done so—and well done to it, but a more genuine, extended commitment from the MOD would be welcome and is, indeed, absolutely necessary. If my hon. Friend the Minister cannot deal with the issue when he responds, I hope that somebody will write to me about how 10:10 is being pursued in the MOD. I do not underestimate the scale of the task, because 1 per cent. of our land mass—as well as a huge number of properties—is the responsibility of the MOD. The Navy is also pivotal in dealing with piracy. Many Devonport warships have been involved in recent times in operations in Somalia, Yemen and so on. That underlines the importance of international co-operation. A ship that falls prey to piracy could be sailing from a port in one country to a port on the other side of the world; it could be owned by a third country and crewed by people from all over the world, sailing through international waters. That is precisely why there is a role for Europe in defence. I also took note of the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham about the importance of alliances and the bigger role that might perhaps be played by the Parliamentary Assemblies of NATO and the Western European Union. I would add the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe to that list. There has been much debate over the question of burden sharing in this Parliament, and I sometimes wonder whether, with more organisation, we parliamentarians might not play a more focused role in trying to shine the spotlight on that. In reforming the House, we have voted to give greater independence to Select Committees, allowing them to vote for their Chairs in future. If our party does not get the handsome majority to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham referred in future Parliaments —perhaps that might not happen immediately, but at some future point—we would need to consider as a House how we scrutinise defence and how the Government carry out such scrutiny, as well as the role that a Defence Committee could play. I want to point hon. Members' attention towards our report, produced in a previous Session, on the future of NATO and European security and defence policy. We looked at how things were done in other countries and, with the hon. Member for Salisbury (Robert Key), I went to Copenhagen. It was interesting to see how, with a hung Parliament, they were able to carry out defence scrutiny in a way that had some consistency over the period of a Parliament. With all parties having committed to a strategic defence review in each Parliament, we might also need to consider, as a House and as a Defence Committee, how we perform our scrutiny role in evolving a defence policy that can have the support of the whole House over a period of time. There will be huge challenges to be faced in that future Parliament. Budget constraints are unlikely to ease. I say unlikely, but I cannot see any circumstances in which they will ease, even if we argued for defence to be better recognised—a case that all those present for defence debates would advance. Defence is a core activity of any Government and the nature of procuring equipment and services is, quantitatively and qualitatively, very different from other departmental expenditures and procurements. One proposal advanced in the Bernard Grey report was that we should attempt to obtain a 10-year commitment to defence spending. That is a big ask, but it could reap huge benefits. There is a unique case to be made as far as defence is concerned. The Government have gone some way towards that in talking about having a 10-year planning horizon, but as that evolves we should keep it well under scrutiny. In concluding, I want to mention the huge public support that exists for our armed forces, which has never been more evident—whether at Wootton Bassett or during armed forces week—and is spreading to more and more communities. I also want to mention last year's Command Paper, the external reference group that has been set up to make sure that its findings are carried forward and developed, the recognition study from which that was built, and the work of the Royal British Legion and myriad charities that have responded in a way that recognises the increased tempo and sustained deployment of our armed forces. Just last week, the Big Lottery Fund committed the substantial sum of £35 million to a programme called Forces in Mind, undertaking to work closely with existing forces' charities to help people who come out of the armed forces, or back from deployment, with that period of adjusting to civilian life, which can sometimes be very difficult. That recognition needs to be matched in the quality of the work that lies ahead on the strategic defence review, which I hope will benefit from the work of the Defence Committee, not only in this Parliament on the many reports that we have recently worked on that will flow into the work of the strategic defence review, but in the next Parliament as well.