Sir Bernard Jenkin
MP for Harwich and North Essex · Conservative · United Kingdom
“Despite long and historic disagreements between successive UK Governments and Israel, it has remained a steadfast ally in counter-terrorist efforts to keep our people safe in this country. We are now embarked, it seems, on a full diplomatic dispute with Israel and tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats.”
“I would very much have liked to have discussed the medical devices questions arising from the Bill. The Minister made an incredibly short speech about that important matter. It is quite clear that these provisions are part of the covert dynamic alignment with the EU and the covert rejoin agenda being pursued by the Government.”
“I am as keen as anybody to get on with discussing the Health Bill, but this topic is too serious an opportunity to miss, given that the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) has raised such important issues. I really commend his speech and his initiative. Everybody should read it.”
“The Minister shakes her head, but she is yet to give a good reason as to why this measure is in the Bill. When we had an Adjournment debate in July with the then Minister for patient safety, the hon.”
“The chief executive of the CQC is wantonly conflicted in terms of looking after the safe space, so he cannot be the one left in charge of that function. The real point here is that we are missing the opportunity to save so much money. Governments keep having public inquiries.”
“I asked the Minister, in a letter I sent her after the debate in July, to give us the information on how much the transfer of all this would cost. Nothing has arrived. I never had a reply to the letter. Of course, the Government have changed the Minister and the new Minister for patient safety, the right hon.”
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“I know that those are political points, but we are underselling our influence with our most important ally. So much of what we do in defence and security policy is about maintaining influence over the one country that guarantees our defence and security. If we lose that influence, we will lose the leverage that this country, uniquely in the world, has an opportunity to use, and not just to the benefit of this country, but to the benefit of Europe and the whole world. I am talking about the ability to broaden the American perspective and encourage the Americans to bring more people with them, rather than finding themselves fighting on their own. We must address that, but to do so we need to address our entire defence and security policy, as my right hon. Friend the Chairman of the Defence Committee said.”
“Friends have already raised—whereby we have failed to deliver what our closest ally felt entitled to expect at the outset, namely a relative proportion of the effort, willpower and sustainment to deliver that sense of solidarity. For everything that our brilliant armed forces achieved in Basra, we left behind a feeling that we had not pulled our weight. For all the sacrifices that our armed forces made, what a terrible tragedy that that should be the feeling in much of Washington and much of the American military establishment, and the same looks to be happening in Helmand. With 17,000 US troops coming into Helmand, against our 8,300 to 8,500—I acknowledge that we are putting in the extra 700 for a temporary period—how will we be entitled to our share of command? How will we be entitled to take credit for whatever is achieved?”
“Pakistan is a friendly country, but what is coming out of Pakistan is the main threat to our country today, and we are spending a pitifully small amount on confronting that threat. Finally, the third grand strategic point for the United Kingdom in considering the topic of defence in the world is this. If we are to be a country that contributes something substantial to our security, and if more troops are needed in Afghanistan and the Americans are sending more, what will be the consequence of our being unable to do so or simply refusing to do so? What will be the consequence of our simply not providing the resources that our security requires in the region? We also have the Basra parallel in Helmand—a point that I was going to raise in my speech, but which several of my right hon. and hon.”
“The document states: “In December… we announced our largest bilateral programme of counter-terrorism support and capacity-building, worth”— wait for it—“£10m.” Ten million pounds is not a great deal of money, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As a country that has an extraordinarily close relationship with Pakistan, we could leverage the American effectiveness hugely, if only we devoted more resources and people to what the Americans are trying to achieve, but we are simply not doing it. I do not know what special forces may or may not be doing in Pakistan, and that is not something that I intend to ask the Minister about. However, what we are providing, in terms of our official armed forces personnel in Pakistan, our diplomatic mission and our overseas aid effort, and in our military-to-military relationship, is pitifully small.”
“They are providing the capability that will give the Pakistani military the confidence and the capability to tackle the modern threats instead of preoccupying themselves vainly with the non-threat of India. How does that compare with what we offer? On page 13, the Government’s document, under the heading “The UK’s strategic objectives”, states that we will help Pakistan “achieve its vision of becoming a stable, economically and socially developed democracy and meet its poverty reduction targets” and encourage “constructive Pakistani engagement on nuclear security and non-proliferation.” Those are laudable aims, but to what do they add up when dealing with the crunch problem?”
“I have mentioned in the House previously my concern about the disproportionality of our effort. We are putting so much effort into Afghanistan, yet so little into Pakistan. I am encouraged by the Americans’ determination. The section of their paper entitled, “Assisting Pakistan’s capability to fight extremists” states: “It is vital to strengthen our efforts to both develop and operationally enable Pakistani security forces so they are capable of succeeding in sustained counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations. In part this will include increased U.S. military assistance for helicopters to provide air mobility, night vision equipment, and training and equipment specifically for Pakistani Special Operation Forces and their Frontier Corps.” Bravo to the Americans!”
“The part of the document that assesses the current situation in Pakistan refers to the “severe challenges” facing the Pakistan Government, the sharply deteriorating economic situation and the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks. It states: “This shocking event reflected the wider problems Pakistan faces with violent extremism and terrorism. Al Qaida continues to operate in the FATA… Afghan groups also train and plan attacks on international and Afghan targets in Afghanistan from the FATA.” The document goes on to refer to the “separatist insurgency continuing in the province of Baluchistan” and makes the crucial claim: “So far, however, there are no signs that terrorism or violent extremism in Pakistan are decreasing.” Until we address that problem, how will we tackle others?”
“I agree with my hon. Friend to some extent, but even he is dealing at a sub-strategic level. That leads me to my next point about the importance of Pakistan. I commend the Government for including Afghanistan and Pakistan in the same document, although we were slightly playing catch-up with the Americans, who were already on that track. However, Pakistan is crucial. There are 800,000 citizens of our country who have Pakistani origin. [Interruption.] The Minister says that there are probably more. However, thousands and thousands of untraceable exchanges and movements between Pakistan and our country are a direct security threat to our streets, towns and cities.”
“Traditionally, in the past few decades, we have conducted such debates in peacetime. We are now debating a war, and it is absurd that we include it in a general debate about defence policy. It does not make sense.”
“I just wish to make it clear that I am sure that the rules of engagement reflect the legal advice that has been given, and that I make absolutely no criticism of the commanding officer of the ship involved, but will the Minister explain what is wrong in law with detaining someone who clearly has all the paraphernalia of piracy and is, circumstantially at least, exhibiting a threat? This seems inexplicable. The law must be deficient in this regard, and it must be changed even if we need a UN resolution in order to be able to do so.”
“We are indeed looking forward to seeing the Minister before the Select Committee tomorrow. We just hope that he will allow time for us to ask the questions. Apart from the helicopters, what equipment is being reassigned from Iraq to Afghanistan?”
“There is an extremely controversial planning application in my constituency on the edge of the Dedham Vale area of outstanding natural beauty, which would have a severe impact on that area. Could time be found for us to debate the protection of areas of outstanding natural beauty, and is it possible that we could have a debate on how that particular application can be called in for a public inquiry?”
“If I recall correctly, we were promised a debate on the Government’s statement on Afghanistan and Pakistan last week, but that has been understandably replaced by the debate on swine flu next Thursday. When will we have the debate on Afghanistan and Pakistan? We may be short of parliamentary time for many of these debates, but we are not sitting for very many days this Session. We could always sit beyond 21 July—indeed, I do not recall rising so early for the summer recess before.”
“On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I find it difficult to believe that an hon. Member who has accepted the findings of a Committee in a disciplinary case of his can subsequently come back to the House and call into question the judgments that that Committee has made. That seems to be what the hon. Member is doing.”
“The great danger, for example, of instantly deciding that a panacea for one of our problems is the direct employment of our staff by the House is that it fundamentally misunderstands the role of a Member. We should be strengthening our ability to make independent judgments on behalf of our constituents and in the interests of our nation, instead of becoming part of a more and more amorphous corporation. We enter the House not to join the establishment but to challenge the establishment, and the independence of our arrangements in our offices is absolutely fundamental to that purpose. The Kelly commission must be made to understand that.”
“Voters are also angry because MPs appear to cost more and more but to do less and less: shorter hours, longer recesses, less and less power to scrutinise legislation properly, fewer and fewer votes on substantive issues and more and more decisions taken in Whitehall, Brussels and elsewhere. We must, however, take ultimate responsibility for the outcome. The advantage of the Kelly approach is that he will return to some fundamental principles, and we ought to approach these questions from first principle, instead of trying to patch up the existing system. What is the role of a Member? What does he or she require to do his or her job? What is it legitimate to expect the taxpayer to pay for? How should the system command public confidence?”
“There is quite an argument for handing back to HMRC the whole question of what we get and what should and should not be taxed, so that we are treated like ordinary citizens, instead of treating ourselves as special. We must recognise that those fundamental problems have arisen because we have moved from an age of deference to an age of reference: from an age when people respected institutions for what they purported to be, to an age when people, through the internet and the media, expect individual accountability and exposure in a way that was never accepted before. We are 20 years behind the rest of society in that respect. The denial in respect of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, furthermore, was a crass own goal for which those responsible should take some responsibility.”
“Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire, we cannot just go back to a sticking-plaster on the discredited system that is the Green Book. The Green Book is a discredited system, and the failure to accept that fundamental point for some time has got us into more and more problems. Various comments have been made about our allowances and salaries. That is the fundamental problem: what we claim, our expenses, have in fact become part of our remuneration, and the public will never accept that. They will also never accept the special tax rules that we give ourselves. Members ought to try explaining to a small business man in their constituency why we should have rules, with Revenue and Customs, that we would never dream of giving them.”
“Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young), the Chairman of the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, I thought that we would have an outbreak of real dignity and common sense in the House. Instead, we have had a scrappy, miserable debate, albeit illuminated by some exceptional speeches. My hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson) gave a heartfelt speech. How can Members on the Treasury Bench force through the amendment on Greater London Members having heard that speech? I noted that the Leader of the House kindly came to the Chamber to hear those remarks, and I hope that she will address the issue when she winds up. Having accepted the amendment of my right hon.”
“I agree with a great deal of what the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) said, but not with his last main point, and not because we are a sovereign House. I ask him to reflect on this: if we cannot trust ourselves, and cannot be trusted by the British people to sort out our own pay and allowances, how on earth can we be trusted with the nuclear deterrent, the state of the economy and the other much more important things with which we are meant to be trusted? My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) made the sane point that the proposals may be very good, but may require adjustment. However, I agree with the hon. Member for Pendle that if we are to adjust those proposals, we will have to do so with great care. When the Leader of the House appeared to accept the amendment of my right hon.”
“May I read back to the Minister part of his statement? He said, “People wrongly say that this is about tackling stretch by using the reserve to plug gaps in the regular forces.” Although we understand that he has to put a brave face on the decisions that he is having to take today, will he at least be realistic? Where would we be without the medics, the helicopter pilots and even the infantry reservists, and the professional Army had to try to manage current operations on its own? The reserves are filling gaps, and reducing reserve and TA forces further means that fewer gaps will be filled when we need to fill them.”
“I apologise to the Secretary of State for missing the opening moments of his speech—it is ironic that a ten-minute Bill does not always have to last 10 minutes. Can the Secretary of State explain why this global downturn has occurred, whether it started here and what has caused it if not policy mistakes by this Government and a number of other Governments around the world?”
“As business and high earners take flight, Labour has forgotten one of Ronald Reagan’s mantras, which was taken to heart by new Labour in the old days, “You do not make the poor richer by making the rich poorer.” The former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, is reported to be in despair about that particular choice in the Budget. That leaves spending cuts. The Leader of the Opposition is right to say that in future Departments must be judged not by how much they spend but by how much they save. The real tragedy will be unemployment. A new Conservative Government must make it absolutely plain that any pain inflicted by tax increases or spending restraint is to restore the growth of the economy and of jobs in this country. Once again, a Labour Government will be leaving office with unemployment higher than that which they inherited—”
“In the longer term, it will drive businesses to relocate elsewhere, to lower tax environments. It is all very well saying that some Scandinavian countries have high personal taxation, but they do not have the internationally competitive financial services sector that we thrive on in this country. They would not attract business of the kind on which so much of our economy now depends; nor would we if we were to set similar tax rates. By all means, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West can start that debate, but I reckon he is about 30 years behind the curve, unable even to convince the former Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, the right hon. Member for North Tyneside. The idea that that one tax change will yield an extra £5.3 billion over the next three years is utter moonshine.”
“Friend the Leader of the Opposition for not ruling out further tax rises, and some will probably be necessary, but he will be all too aware that the scope for further tax rises is limited if we are not to continue to damage the supply side of the economy and the recovery itself. Let us take as an example the 50 per cent. top tax rate, now proposed, and the devastating critique that we heard from the right hon. Member for North Tyneside (Mr. Byers). The 50 per cent. rate is having immediate effect on City salaries, as employers negotiating to recruit people from overseas will have to offer more than they would have done before the Budget to attract that same person to come to the City of London to work in our internationally competitive financial services sector.”
“The cost of debt interest is now nearly as large as the entire defence budget, and nobody in their right mind can regard that as a suitable allocation of the national resources. It is paying for today by borrowing from tomorrow, and it is one of the reasons why the British people are so angry with this Government. Any new Government will have to choose from only three options available to address national debt: inflate our way out of it, tax our way out of it or reduce public spending as a proportion of national income. We have heard many siren voices advocating a dose of inflation, but they invite many more dangers than solutions. The pain of defeating inflation is etched on the memory of this House and this nation, and we do not want to go there again. I applaud my right hon.”
“That damages market confidence that the Government can service their debts and manage the economy effectively. Far from “entrenching a low-debt economy”, as the Labour manifesto laughably promised, Labour will have doubled the national debt to £1.4 trillion, and that is leaving aside all the unfunded and off-balance-sheet liabilities such as private finance initiatives, pensions and so on. Every child born today assumes a notional debt of £22,500, which is rather more than the Chancellor has put into their child trust fund. For all the commitment of Labour politicians to the growth and sustainability of public spending increases, the fastest-growing public spending programme in recent years has not been education or health, but debt interest.”
“According to Citigroup, even in the second quarter of 2008, the United Kingdom had debts worth 400 per cent. of gross domestic product. If we compare that with our G8 competitors, we see that France comes nearest to that, but it has only 176 per cent. The Government failed to control borrowing, which was used to fund consumption. Every year, the then Chancellor’s forecasts on borrowing were wrong. In 2003, he said that borrowing for 2003-04 would be £24 billion, but the outturn was £37.5 billion. His borrowing projections in that Budget for the next four years—2003 to 2007—even in a period of stable growth, were wrong again, by £52.5 billion. The present Chancellor is now planning to borrow £269 billion more over the next five years than he was in November, just a few months ago.”
“Reliance on the City and the financial sector as a driver of economic growth and a source of taxation blinded both Governments to the dangers of the unsustainable bubble in property and house prices and of the level of debt of households, corporations and the Government. After living beyond our means for so long, the public finances could not cope with even a modest recession, let alone with the catastrophe that we now face. I would say to the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury that this is not the consequence of Thatcherism. Mrs. Thatcher was elected to 12 years of government after coining the phrase that we cannot spend more than we can earn. That mantra was studiously ignored by the present Prime Minister when he was Chancellor.”
“Certainly, the United States Government were responsible for the structural failures in the American financial system, but those failures were replicated in this country in even more extreme form. The UK banks were even more highly geared than their American counterparts. This is a crisis of Anglo-Saxon economic management, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) adumbrated, but it is one for which British and American politicians stand jointly responsible, based not least on the utter hubris of their belief that politicians could abolish boom and bust.”
“The fact is that the UK and US Governments became convinced that any recession threat could be averted by lowering interest rates, and that it was therefore permissible to go on borrowing against the economic cycle indefinitely. Low interest rates, low inflation and steady growth disguised the unsustainability of the structural debt and the massive trade imbalances that had built up in the global economy. This was not the crisis of high interest rates and inflation of post-war experience; it emerged in the financial sector that was regulated by the US and UK Governments. Its first symptom was the credit crunch, which might have emerged in America, although the first bank to fall over was Northern Rock, over here.”
“The Budget should have provided a clear path to balancing spending and taxation, but it does not do so. The Chancellor has put off such decisions until after a general election. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has devastatingly confirmed that the scale of the deficit next year will be far bigger than the merely cyclical deficit that occurs during a downturn in the economy. Much, if not most, of this deficit is structural. For years, many Conservative Members warned that the Government were living beyond their means, and urged Ministers to rectify the situation, only to be met with the usual cries about Tory cuts. We heard that again from the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) this evening.”
“However, that increase has not produced the improvements in outcomes, treatment or experiences for patients in the health service that we always expected to see. As speaker after speaker on the Conservative Benches has demonstrated, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell) has just ably and articulately described, the Budget is not a best judgment about growth, spending and taxation, reflecting the best interests of this country and our people. It is not even just a missed opportunity to start the rescue of the public finances and restore economic competence. Rather, this Budget is the last, desperate throw of the dice by a Government who are simply playing for time. Everyone was aware before the Budget that the public finances were in a dire state.”
“Let us look at the state of the health service, which is awash with money in my constituency, with the primary care trust desperately disbursing money on this and that little project at the end of the financial year in order to get rid of it. The public sector is apparently completely isolated from the reality that is engulfing the rest of the economy, including the small businesses and wealth creators in my constituency. Having nearly doubled public expenditure on the national health service over the period of this Government, we have hardly seen any commensurate increase in the productivity of the health service. Yes, there have been improvements in health outcomes and in wages in the health service, and an enormous increase in manpower.”
“Before I start my remarks, I want to return briefly to the disarming honesty of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris), who gave us a speech of philosophical exploration that might have been more appropriate at the beginning of a period of Labour Government than towards the end of one. As I reflect on his extolling of the virtues and the role of the public sector in the social and economic life of our country, it occurs to me that I would have greeted his speech more sympathetically if the huge increases that we have seen disbursed on public services, notably education and health, had produced commensurate increases in the quality and output of those services. However, although school buildings may have improved, for example, educational standards have continued to decline.”
“How much do the Government now regret massaging their fiscal rules in order to carry on borrowing through the years of growth rather than paying down much more debt during the good years? That is why when an economic downturn came, as might have always been inevitable, the public finances were not better prepared than they are today.”
“Is she really comfortable with being so obstructive on a purely partisan basis, when she should be representing the interests of the whole House?”
“and learned Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell), my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) and the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), among others. The remit of the resolution passed on 8 December makes no reference whatever to the issue of privilege. It also insists that there should be a Government majority on the Committee in question, which is not in the spirit of the way in which the Committee on Standards and Privileges operates. The Leader of the House is now the only apparent obstruction to following the procedure set out on pages 167 and 168 of “Erskine May”—namely, to refer the matter to the Committee on Standards and Privileges in the normal way. Why is she obstructing the House in that way?”
“May I return the attention of the right hon. and learned Lady to early-day motion 1307? [That this House notes the statement of the Director of Public Prosecutions on 16 April 2009 announcing his decision that no charges would be brought against the hon. Member for Ashford in relation to the documents leaked and stating that, ‘Mr Green's purpose in using the documents was apparently to hold the Government to account'; and calls for the House to be given the opportunity to debate a motion to refer the matter to the Committee on Standards and Privileges.] The motion seeks to refer the issue of the arrest of my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green) to the Committee on Standards and Privileges, and it is sponsored by three very senior Members of this House from all parties, notably the right hon.”
“The language issue is like “The Hunting of the Snark”. Perhaps the Minister of State can explain what a “Boojum” is when he finds one. On the question of Typhoon, can the Minister of State explain what is happening with tranche 3? I understand that it has been split into tranche 3A and tranche 3B, and there is international agreement that tranche 3B should proceed with us counting 30 aircraft off to Saudi Arabia as part of our tranche. Why will not the Treasury agree that? Or is every major procurement decision now being stalled by the Treasury?”
“May I place a slightly different emphasis on these events? I was talking to Ministers at the time, and without breaching any confidences, I can say that it was quite clear, as my hon. Friend says, that we were going to go to war. However, there were ministerial decisions to try to disguise decisions that were being taken as having nothing to do with the possibility of invading Iraq, and to delay decisions that were obviously to do with that possibility, because they were embarrassing the Government. It might have embarrassed Ministers if they had pre-empted a decision that Parliament was going to take, when it would have been responsible to let Vickers tool up the tanks for desert warfare, for example, instead of waiting until the last minute.”
“That means that each nation has a different doctrine of operations, which leads to the Germans buying one kind of rifle while the French buy another, and we have our own rifle, which is different from the American rifle. This is because we practise military warfare in slightly different ways. Unless we are going to try to standardise the politics of all the nations, we will end up with different military doctrines and different things that we find it important, or not important, to do.”
“Often, by the time we find ourselves in a situation in which we urgently require the kit for a particular operation, we have to buy off the shelf or mix and match on the ground in order to deal with a threat that has arisen against the vehicle that we are using at the time. I am minded to point out to the hon. Member for Crosby that the European context is just one of the contexts in which we operate internationally. In fact, for the British, the American context is possibly more important than the European context. A point to emphasise in the European context is that each nation puts its forces into battle backed by its own national perspective, its own values and its own moral limits.”
“May I crave the indulgence of the House for a moment, and compare the speech just delivered by my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Ann Winterton) with that made by the hon. Member for Crosby (Mrs. Curtis-Thomas) earlier? Both talked about the complexity of buying the right armoured vehicles for a given situation in a particular conflict. The fact that the circumstances described in each of those speeches were so diverse rather made the point that, however much we might wish to standardise and to make things simple for ourselves, it is always easier to talk about that than to deliver it.”
“Britain and Europe’s response to the changed circumstances after 9/11 has been wholly inadequate. Thirdly, it is most important to remind the House that defence spending increases in the UK were relatively modest compared with spending increases in other policy areas. Since 1997—the last year of the Major Government —core defence spending up until 2007-08 increased by £4.5 billion in real terms. In the same period, real-terms increases in health spending were £44 billion—10 times as much. In education, the increase was £35 billion. Even the spending for the police has been increased by nearly as much as defence spending, and the railways have had an even bigger increase than defence.”
“The Government are consciously compromising future capabilities to fund current operations, as I have said many times before in the Chamber. Secondly, we must compare the rises in our defence expenditure with those of our allies and rivals. According to SIPRI—the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which produces the respected international tables for comparing defence expenditure—between 2001 and 2007, our defence spending apparently rose by 22 per cent. in real terms. I find that hard to believe, given the figure that the Minister quoted earlier, but there are statistics and there are statistics. However, the comparable international statistics show that our 22 per cent. increase compares with India’s 32 per cent., America’s 59 per cent., Russia’s 66 per cent. and China’s 108 per cent.”
“The first and most obvious is that, since 2001, the armed forces have been operating well beyond the defence planning assumptions. Whatever urgent operational requirements may have been funded, the real increases in the core defence budget have not been enough to maintain the capabilities required for the operations being undertaken in Iraq and Afghanistan. I refer to the speech made by my right hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hampshire (Mr. Arbuthnot), the Chairman of the Defence Committee. He talked about the compromises between current operations and future capabilities, and about Professor Hew Strachan’s writing on today’s wars and tomorrow’s wars. Those points are expressly illustrated by the national security strategy.”
“Of course, defence never has enough money, but the Department’s decisions over the past 10 years have been taken in an atmosphere of unparalleled fiscal restraint, which has progressively got worse and is likely to become worse still in the current climate. We know that the procurement spending round PR08 was never really settled; it was just imposed, and the Ministry of Defence decided to live with that. We are told that PR09 has now run its course, and that there has been no resolution between the Department and the Treasury about it. There is a stand-off, but the Department somehow has to continue to function, albeit in an extraordinarily dysfunctional way. The Department repeats the mantra that it has had record increases in funding, but, as ever, it fails to mention the real contexts.”
“The failures of the Ministry of Defence’s procurement programme are manifold and too numerous to discuss in detail in the short time allowed for this debate. Some, including the A400M, have been brought about by industry failures. Many of us prophesied that the A400M, being mainly a political aeroplane rather than a military requirement, would get into the muddle that it is now in. That project, like the Typhoon before it, highlights the problems of pan-national, pan-European programmes, which inevitably end up involving political compromises that suit no one. Other projects, such as FRES and the Chinook mark 3, offer lessons in departmental incompetence that must be learned. The spectre at the feast of the MOD’s trouble is always the money.”
“My hon. Friend reinforces the points on both sides of the argument. Yes, there are virtues in standardisation, but there will always be requirements to do things differently in different circumstances, which will lead people in different directions. I want to turn to the Minister’s opening speech, which had an atmosphere of unreality about it. I say that with the greatest respect, and I intend no personal criticism of him; this is what Ministers do. He went straight into a discussion of current operations and the success of the urgent operational requirement programme, but avoided discussing the serious structural crisis at the heart of the Ministry of Defence, which is what this debate should be about. The numbers involved are much bigger than the amounts being spent on urgent operational requirements.”