Strategic Defence and Security Review

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will excuse me if I make a little progress first. I listened to my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces, who, with characteristic elegance, endeavoured to say that it was simply a matter of accounting. It is not a matter of accounting for the budget holder of a Department, out of whose budget the money must come, who knows that a request of the Chief Secretary for more is likely to be refused. When there are difficult decisions to make, such as the closure of bases, whether a particular capability should be maintained or whether infantry battalions should be disbanded, and one is aware of an obligation to find some £20 billion in the next period, it seems inevitable that the decisions about the conventional elements of defence are bound to be affected. To put it colloquially, four Trident submarines would be four elephants in the room. In this country, we lack a proper review of nuclear policy. I cannot recall in the 23 years that I have been a Member a review conducted other than on the basis that we have always had four submarines since Harold Macmillan went to the Bahamas and persuaded Jack Kennedy that we should have access to Poseidon. It is argued that, therefore, we should have four submarines and the maximum number of warheads—at least potentially. I remember the days when the argument in the House was not about having a deterrent, but about whether a Labour Government in 1992 under Neil Kinnock would build the fourth submarine. That was of great significance to the constituents of the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), to whom I shall briefly give way.