Defence Procurement Speech

House of Commons

Robert Key (Salisbury) (Con): I apologise to the House, to the Minister for the Armed Forces and to my hon. Friend the Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) for missing most of the opening speeches. As the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy) mentioned, she, the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Jones) and I were at a meeting to discuss coroners inquests and that is why we were delayed.

I decided to change the habit of a lifetime today by not concentrating on specific defence procurement issues that might affect my constituency and instead taking a broader view of defence procurement and why we need to do it at all. I should like to explain why, if I were Prime Minister, I would wish to double the defence budget over 10 years. Of course, that will not happen under any Government, but I should like to explain why we sometimes need to take a step back and think about why we have defence procurement at all. Is it a question of boys’ toys or something rather more serious?

During the summer, I attended the funeral of a distinguished former war correspondent from the second world war, latterly a great expert on Nelson, who was the author of more than 20 books. One of those books was drawn to my attention, and I read it during the recess. This remarkable book, which is called “East and West of Suez: the Retreat from Empire”, was written by Tom Pocock in 1986. It talks of the great days of the British Navy and the 1953 Spithead review. He talks about the celebrations that took place:

“Foremost among them was to be the traditional naval review at Spithead off Portsmouth, when, tricked out with fluttering bunting and burnished brass and to the sound of bugles and saluting guns, the British displayed the realities of power. Two hundred warships of the Royal Navy lay at anchor, including the beautiful battleship Vanguard and seven aircraft carriers, while three hundred naval aircraft waited at airfields ashore to fly overhead as the royal yacht steamed between the long lines of grey ships.”

He then points out that there was a lot of fighting between the defence chiefs:

“the Board of Admiralty was demanding a yet more generous share of the defence budget for research and development, aircraft production and ship-building. This brought them into conflict with the Air Council which was bidding for a force of long-range jet-powered bombers to drop the atomic bombs which were now being delivered to the RAF. The air marshals were allowed their bombers, which were to be called the Valiant, the Victor and the Vulcan and, collectively, the V-bombers, but the admirals were disappointed. True, eight aircraft carriers were under construction but work was proceeding slowly on three cruisers, which had been laid down about ten years before, and the Admiralty maintained that at least seventeen were needed.”

Some might say those were the days, but the only reason why those things happened was that the British public—the electors—knew that they needed such a scale of armament and those procurement programmes. We seem to have forgotten all that in the intervening years. We tend to think of high-intensity conflict as a very important subject, but we do not actually think of what is needed. After all, the traditional reasons for going to war have changed dramatically. We are not looking after territorial advantage now, or aiming for territorial expansion. We are not setting up new empires around the world. We are far more interested in acquiring armoured vehicles, guns or aircraft—platforms, as we must now call them—and systems to go with them because we are more interested in homeland defence and security. We are no longer concerned with the threat of invading armies; we are more interested in cyber warfare. Peace enforcement is a crucial part of the operation of the forces, as is guarding against terrorism, and deterring and defeating it.

However, there is also the matter of our country’s need for global trade and travel. That is what we have done for hundreds of years, it is a legacy of empire and Commonwealth, and it is very important today. Owing to the fact that 90 per cent. of our trade is carried out by ship, we need a long reach to protect that trade.

Chris Ruane: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Robert Key: No, I shall not give way at this stage.

We may no longer be quite so concerned with the Spratleys in the South China sea, and perhaps we should turn our attention more to the north-west passage and the implications for trade routes between China, Japan and Europe via the north of Canada resulting from climate change, and the international tensions that are building over that situation. However, we are talking about things that touch the lives of every citizen every day, but they do not realise it.

There are 16 or 17 Members of Parliament present for this debate, because the Whips have decided that there is not much legislative business and, as usual, have popped in a defence debate. I am very grateful to them for allowing us to have such a debate—it does not happen very often—but the House should be packed on such an occasion and it is not. Whether we are talking about importing fair trade bananas from the Windward islands, fridges from China, television sets from Taiwan or cars from Japan, we are talking about the need for a global reach to defend our trade, our standing of living, our quality of life, our influence in the world and the British national interest. That is what is at stake, which is why we still need to procure such very expensive systems. It is why we shall continue for a long time—indeed, for ever—to need an Army, a Navy and an Air Force. There is much loose talk around to the effect that we will not need an Air Force when we have unmanned aerial vehicles. We will. We shall need expertise to operate those platforms whether they are manned or not, and we shall need the Navy because we must have global reach to protect our British interests and our alliances around the world.

We will need an Army, of course, to help in the defence of the homeland, but also to ensure that we can project our standards of life, our morality and our ethical stance in the world, and so that we can look after humanitarian aid and carry out peace enforcement and peacekeeping as well as high-intensity warfare when the need arises.

If we can explain that to the taxpayer—indeed, if we could explain it to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the shadow Chancellor and the 620 Members of Parliament who are not here—the defence budget might rise up the political agenda, and more people might share my view that, over a 10-year period, we should in the national interest double the defence budget.

The usual suspects from all parities are debating, with great expertise, the need to hold the Government to account on the issue of particular procurement programmes, but that misses the main point: in a democracy such as ours—an international country—that is at the cutting edge of military capability, we still need to persuade the taxpayer that procurement matters. For people to go to Tesco, the Navy, Army and the Air Force must ensure that all the products can get there and be safe once they do so. It is as simple as that. However, we do not make that effort.

The Defence Committee has spent six months going to all the major NATO countries—it is off to Georgia and Turkey next week—and they all say that the public are not prepared to pay. The American public are prepared. The British public pay for more than anyone else in Europe, but other nations apparently do not think that that is important. It is important, and we need to convince the taxpayer of that, not by obscure arguments about whether one version of FRES is better than another or about who will win the contract for the next big order, but in relation to where the national, personal and family interests lie in having the best equipment and the best conditions for armed services personnel. If we can argue the case in such a way, the British taxpayer will realise its relevance, and then the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the shadow Chancellor might agree that we should double the defence budget over a 10-year period