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Defence in the World

Just as Oppositions make statements and claims, Governments have the responsibility to act, and this party and this Government have acted in the defence of our overall armed forces. The Conservative party did not do so. Despite the rhetoric of the shadow Secretary of State, in his calmer moments there has been some candour on these issues. I came across an interview that he gave back in October 2006, when he accepted Conservative responsibility for slashing defence spending. He said:""I think very frankly we"—" the Conservative party—""made some mistakes ourselves in government in that we were very keen to take a peace dividend at the end of the cold war."" When the interviewer said to him,""You're saying the last Conservative government cut the armed forces too severely?"," the hon. Gentleman responded:""I think we were too optimistic about the security position world wide following the cold war."" That means yes.