Strategic Defence and Security Review

May I associate myself absolutely with the remarks that the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) made about Wootton Bassett? Let me also add my thanks to the Backbench Business Committee for securing such an important debate at such an important time. I also commend the Defence Committee Chair, the right hon. Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot), on his speech, on the Committee report that he led and, if I may say so, on making me welcome and part of the process, as a new member of the Committee and a new Member of the House. I want to build on some of the things that have been said. It is important to make the point that Members on both sides of the House should learn from our recent history in this area under Governments of both colours. I should also like to press those in the new Government on how important is it that they should live up to the standards that they set for themselves in opposition. It is the case that successive Governments allowed the equipment programme to grow. That was not the preserve simply of the previous Government, although we have to recognise that it did grow, in part as a response to conflicts that no one seriously predicted at the time, but also because of our commitment to the Gray report, notwithstanding the important point made about that earlier. There is a need to correct that in the strategic defence and security review, but we, too, recognised that the correction needed to happen. It is important that the new Government go into the process with the right approach, which is why it is alarming that this does not necessarily seem to be happening and why the report that the Committee published this week is so critical, as was reflected in the right hon. Gentleman's speech. The point about not making commitments in opposition that no Government can afford has been amply set out by my right hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth), the shadow Secretary of State, in relation to helicopters and the size of the Army. I do not think that the point needs to be added to further, but I hope that we get a commitment from the Minister in winding up that the Department has secured from the Treasury what it needs to be able to take a long-term view. It is no secret that the Secretary of State has been pressing to be given a 10-year spending envelope in which to make decisions, in recognition of the fact that if cuts are made too gravely in the early years, enormous capability will be lost, when the same size of budget reductions spread over 10 years could deliver a massively different profile. It is fair to say that the Secretary of State has privately indicated that he thought that he had assurances on that commitment. However, given this debate and the obvious uncertainty over the Trident successor programme, which has been touched on and on which I shall comment shortly, it is important that the Department should set out whether it has indeed secured that commitment from the Treasury. Reference has been made to this in different ways, but whatever the outcome of the review, it is also critical that our prized defence industry maintains its capacity to deliver for our armed forces, as well as supporting our manufacturing industry and the many important high-skilled jobs across the country.