Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
Will the right hon. Member give way?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
The debate about percentages of GDP is slightly irrelevant, because even if defence spending were raised to 3%, we have no ability to spend that money within the industrial base, as we do not have the capacity. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to look at a much more innovative approach to some of these things, with multilateral options? I have been campaigning for the UK to join the Defence, Security and Resilience Bank for over a year.
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
I thank the Minister for his statement and for his engagement on this issue. Coastguard rescue officers are an essential part of our emergency response and are much supported by people in Ayrshire, and I put on the record my thanks for their dedicated service. My hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell) and I are very worried that coastguard services in north Ayrshire are facing a crisis if they are not able to claim compensation. I am pleased that the Minister has postponed further meetings and is working with unions, but will he do all he can to resolve this issue, so that our coastguard rescue officers can continue to perform their essential service?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
My concern is that the only British company offering to build an advanced jet trainer replacement for the Red Arrows Hawk jet, AERALIS, has gone into receivership because of the delay in the DIP, which means it will not assemble those lovely British jets in my constituency.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
rose—
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, from sail to ironclad, ironclad to dreadnought, dreadnought to highly capable frigate, we need to make the next generational leap? If we find ourselves caught in programmes that deliver last year’s capability, we will remove any wriggle room or space to make that jump into autonomy and automation.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
Everyone in this debate will rightly speak about defence spending, procurement and ammunition, and those things all absolutely matter, but I want to ask a broader question: what does warfighting readiness actually mean in 2026? For too long, we have measured military strength by the number of ships afloat, aircraft we fly or tanks we field, and those capabilities will remain essential, but recent conflicts have reminded us that wars are rarely won by militaries alone; wars are won by nations. They are won by industries that can out-produce an adversary, economies that can absorb shocks, and societies resilient enough to sustain conflict over time. I have seen this at first hand in Ukraine. Time and again, I have met individuals whose courage is beyond question, but courage alone is not enough. Success depends on whether ammunition arrives when it is needed, whether new technology can be adapted in weeks rather than years, and whether industry can keep pace with the demands of the battlefield. The side that learns, adapts and regenerates fastest gains the advantage, and that should challenge how we think about readiness. Warfighting readiness is no longer simply the responsibility of the Ministry of Defence. It is an industrial strategy, an energy strategy and a technological strategy. Ultimately, it is a national resilience strategy. If our energy networks are vulnerable, if our communications can be disrupted, if our supply chains depend on hostile states, if our British industry cannot rapidly increase production when conflict begins, our armed forces will inherit those weaknesses from day one of any crisis. That is why resilience must sit at the heart of our national security. We often talk about stockpiles, and rightly so, but I think the more important question is not how many missiles are sitting in a warehouse today; it is how many missiles British industry can produce every month after six months of sustained conflict. Modern warfare consumes munitions at a pace that few of us can comprehend or imagine, but Ukraine is teaching us lessons: 7,000 to 10,000 drones flying a day; 12,000 artillery rounds fired a day; and 1 million drones, in some cases, produced over two months.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. Data is the new gunpowder. AI is absolutely critical in defence, and we should use all of our technological advantage to move faster and further than ever before. We should be bold and jump to the next generation of systems, and not wait for anyone else to lead—we should lead ourselves. The lesson from my perspective is clear: stockpiles matter, but the ability to regenerate them matters even more. That is why I welcome the Government’s commitment to rebuild munition stockpiles, expand domestic production capacity and invest in British defence industry. Those are investments not just in military capability, but in national resilience. The same is true for technology. Ukraine has demonstrated that innovation cycles measured in months can outperform procurement cycles measured in decades. Drones, autonomous systems, software and artificial intelligence are changing warfare at an extraordinary speed, and it will only ever get faster. Readiness, therefore, means building a procurement system that can adapt just as quickly, giving innovative British companies a route into defence and ensuring that our armed forces can evolve as rapidly as the threats they face. We have at present over 10,000 people in Defence Equipment and Support—that is, 10,000 people doing procurement. I am not saying that it is inefficient, but I am saying that bureaucracy sometimes gets in the way of speed.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
I completely agree with my hon. Friend. This is about cultural change as much as adopting technology. If we were to adopt even the very simplest AI models now in how we do procurement, and move on to the next generation, we would find that the system speeds up, efficiencies are made and the right kit gets into the right hands far quicker than it does now. Ultimately, rearmament is not about preparing for war because we expect it; it is about ensuring that war never happens in the first place. The purpose of rearmament is deterrence, and deterrence rests on three foundations: capable armed forces, political resolve and the industrial capacity to sustain both. If any one of those is missing, deterrence becomes far less credible when faced with an autocratic nation with huge industrial resilience. As we discuss rearmament today, let us think beyond platforms, procurement and spending lines. The defining lesson of modern conflict is that warfighting readiness is not simply a military condition; it is a national condition.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
I have been clear, since several weeks ago, that I was not content with the funding for the DIP or the transformational nature of it. I have been really encouraged in the last couple of weeks by the speed at which it is moving. We need to move more, and I think the spending review in due course will round that off. My perspective is that we must not underestimate the level of change that is required. This is systemic within the Department and within the single services, and it has to move a quantum leap forward—no pun intended—if we are going to deliver the change that is required. If Britain wants armed forces that are capable of fighting and winning, we must build a country that can endure, adapt and sustain them. In modern conflict, as Ukraine has taught us, the line between the military and civilian worlds has all but disappeared. That is what true readiness looks like, and that is the challenge before us.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
What the hon. Member says brings a huge historical relevance to today. Throughout history, whenever we have been moving towards crisis, we have got rid of almost all of our procurement rules and regulations to streamline capability and get it into the hands of warfighters. Does he agree that the procurement system and those 10,000 people in DE&S could use AI and some of the incoming quantum capabilities to streamline our whole procurement process?
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European Entry and Exit System
Mr Speaker, it is the 10-year anniversary of Brexit, but you would barely know it. There have been absolutely no celebrations whatsoever—no carrying of the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) shoulder-high down the mall, no celebrations of how we spent that extra £350 million per week—but here we have it, the Brexit birthday present after 10 years: a miserable start to people’s holidays and our business being disrupted. Scotland did not vote for Brexit. Scotland wanted nothing whatsoever to do with Brexit, so why are Scottish holidaymakers getting caught up in this situation, and what is the Minister doing to alleviate it?
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European Entry and Exit System
There are clearly significant challenges to work through, and that is not unusual with large-scale technology adoption, as we know. I welcome the fact that the Government are working hard to find the trigger points where measures will be reduced or suspended for periods to try to keep queues to a minimum. There are two areas that I think the Government could do a bit more with. They could do even more to promote the official “Travel to Europe” app, which might help with some of the delays. Will the Government also ensure that perishable goods have prioritised access at ports? That is particularly important for fish exports and other short-life produce, which is critical to our economy.
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
My constituency has coastguard rescue services operating in Nairn, Burghead and at Gordonstoun school. One constituent who works for a local team told me: “After September, the cost would fall entirely on myself or my small business employer—this is not right”, and that the “changes will force me to no longer be available for call outs during working hours”. They also said that they “don’t do this role for financial gain, but the small amount of remuneration enables those of us who are employed to respond to emergency call outs without suffering a financial loss during a cost of living crisis.” Will the Minister give an assurance on two points: that the changes will not be made until we are collectively satisfied that these volunteers have been treated fairly, and that a life-or-death emergency service will not be diminished as a consequence of the changes?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
The hon. Gentleman is very kind to give way again, as he is right in the middle of unpicking the DIP thread by thread. Does he agree that we need to look at the manifest, substantial disappointment that we and everyone in uniform see in the DIP now that it has been announced, and try to reconcile that with how delayed it was? What does he think the Government were doing, given that there are so many black holes and missing spaces in the DIP? What does he think they were debating over the 11 months that the DIP was delayed?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
I thank the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin) for bringing such a prescient and timely debate to the House. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Rawmarsh and Conisbrough (John Healey) and the hon. and gallant Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns) for the step they took against what, in their view, was clearly insufficient investment, resulting in insufficient protection for these islands and the people who live here. The DIP manifestly writes cheques that the Treasury is ill-equipped or ill-prepared to cash. As many Members have said, there is no clear spending plan for how we get to 2030, much less for how we get to 2035. The projected expenditure on defence in the UK is not going to be incremental over those years. We are supposed to believe that, magically, in 2029 we will get to where we need to be in 2030, and the same again in 2034. A lot of us are long enough in the tooth to know that is a load of unbelievable rhetoric. Efficiency savings of £10.7 billion have never happened before, and there is a good reason: it does not happen. That is not how we fund any budget, whether CDEL or RDEL. We do not fund budgets with efficiency savings of that size. This is serious: we have lost a Secretary of State for Defence and one of his Ministers. If we speak to men and women in uniform, as I and many other Members are privileged to do on a regular basis, we sense the palpable fog of dismay as they try—in vain, largely—to figure out what they are expected to do, how they are expected to do it and with what. The DIP generated such expectation, as did the SDR that precipitated it, but once they were finally published, they have generated more questions than answers. Platforms matter. I hear all the time that we need to learn the lessons from Ukraine, and we do need to learn the lessons from those brave warriors defending their homeland in an existential fight with zero strategic depth. However, we are not Ukraine—this is not Ukraine—because we have access to platforms and systems that they do not. We have strategic depth in relation to the contemporary threat we face from Russia. I am not inviting Members to be complacent; I am inviting them to see beyond learning the lessons from Ukraine, and platforms and the replacement thereof do matter. In a very brief summary, the UK just now is fielding clapped-out Vanguard nuclear bombers. When we see them coming back up the Clyde after 200 days under the waves, they look as though they have been raised from the bottom of the sea, not out patrolling for what should be 90 days, not 200 days. It is a dreadful way to treat sailors. Not one of the six completed Astute-class submarines is available for service, which is absolutely unbelievable. The new medium-lift helicopter has rumbled on for a decade, but finally got a grudging order half the size of the original. Ajax is now in its 17th year—it is absolutely incorrigible—and that is not a sophisticated novel system. It is a very good system, but it should not take 17 years. By the time it gets into service, it will be obsolete. Those are just ordinary things that defence in the UK has demonstrated it cannot pull off, yet according to the DIP, we are going to start doing all this exquisite, novel stuff that nobody has done before, and we are going to be world leaders, which the UK always seems to think it has to be. I do not believe a word of it. I hope it is true and I am wrong, but if we cannot do ordinary, how can we be expected to believe that exquisite is just around the corner?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
It has been around for 50 years; it is not novel. The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Tim Roca) referred to £45 billion for the nuclear enterprise. I think the figure in the DIP is £64 billion. That is an important point, because the Government and the one before it have refused to publish the rolling 10-year nuclear enterprise budget. If the Minister could clarify what the nuclear enterprise budget is over the rolling 10-year period, that would be helpful. I am a supporter of defence—there are a few people in here who will testify to that—but the MOD does have a case to answer. It increasingly looks like if we want £1 million of output, we need to put £2 million into the MOD pot. If we look at any Public Accounts Committee report on defence, we can see what a troubled enterprise it is. It needs root and branch reform. I have heard people say quite a lot that we have not told the public about the threat we are under. I agree with that. I think that is a true and an honest assessment, but we need to see beyond the transmission of the threat and be prepared for the response that we might get back. I am not making a constitutional point; I am not talking about Scotland. I am talking about housing schemes and communities up and down these islands. If they are asked to put their families and their own lives on the line for the United Kingdom, they might well not be quite as enthusiastic as we might wish. They might think, “What has my country done for me?” If they are 25 years old and have grown up over the last 20 years they might think, “What has the UK done for me, because I see myself and my generation getting poorer than the generations that went before.” I might be wrong—I hope I am wrong—but we do not know it.
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
First, I thank the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for securing this important urgent question. I have spoken to coastguard rescue officers from Ceredigion Preseli in recent weeks, and they all share common concerns. The first is that as many as half of their colleagues in the coastguard service will reconsider their position should this new proposed model come into effect. Secondly, and just as importantly, there is the impact on partner emergency services. Given the MCA leadership’s statements about the operational impact of these changes, could the Minister ensure that the assessments and the modelling are made public, so that we can properly scrutinise them and have confidence that we understand the consequences of this decision before it comes into effect?
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
This decision is clearly a kick in the teeth for brave people, like Chris from my constituency, who is worried that it will make the situation worse for whistleblowing rights. He challenged a bullying culture, was terminated and then denied his 20-year service medal. But this is not about money, is it? The CRO payments equate to only 1.5% of the agency’s income. I understand the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George) about on-call firefighters, but has the Minister considered options such as the allowances paid to councillors, which do not confer any employment rights and which allow people to do the role alongside their full-time employment?
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Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I wholeheartedly thank the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for securing the debate. Its richness shows that we need also to have it in the main Chamber, because the Government need to tackle this issue head-on. Before I dive in, I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. The Government have done some work, but it still seems that AI policy is done by announcement, rather than by taking a real, strategic overview of how it will power our society, and there is still no sign of an AI Bill. As has been talked about today, AI is everywhere, and the Government must tackle it head-on. They need to see that it is a tool that can be used to benefit our society or that can lead to our society’s demise.
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Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy
Absolutely, and that has been at the core of a lot of our debate today. AI can drive inequalities, break down our society, security and safety, and take away jobs, or it can be used to tackle our biggest problems, empower individuals and drive growth. AI is a bit like the electricity of today—a supercharged version of electricity—and we need to think about where we are going to direct it. At some point, we started using electricity to light our cities and to power our homes, businesses and industries; now we need to think about where we will direct AI, and how we prepare people for that future. The hon. Member for Poole and others talked about the future of our economy, tax and wealth, and there are key examples that highlight how important that is. We have started talking about donkeycorns; Members may have heard of unicorns, but donkeycorns are billion-dollar companies with one or two people. There is a legend that OpenClaw was a one-person company that was sold for £1 billion. That is a real shift in our economy, and we need to tackle it head-on. As Liberal Democrats, we believe in embracing that progress and change, but we also believe in empowering individuals. When it comes to AI, we thought about tackling that big picture, which is why we launched a project called “Everyday AI”. We brought together over 100 global stakeholders from industry and civil society—to look at a Liberal vision for AI and how Britain can thrive in the age of AI. We looked at backing British innovation, empowering people and building trust, and building infrastructure for success. As the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) said, no one knows where we are going. As a Member of Parliament and a politician, I often feel it is difficult to sound neither utopian nor dystopian about this issue. However, it is crucial that we ask the right questions, and keep on asking them, to make sure we are going in the right direction.
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Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy
I am going to advance, because I want to hear from the Minister. Crucially, we need to lean into the opportunities and challenges, and I will share some of our proposals, which I would be happy to discuss with the Minister afterwards. When it comes to leaning into the opportunities, it is about helping start-ups and small and medium-sized enterprises to thrive with AI, with AI procurement guides, skills tax credits and capital expenditure reliefs for AI software and adoption. We need to look at supporting our university spin-outs and the incredible research in this country; quintupling proof of concept funding; having a standardised national framework for negotiating IP between universities and staff; and moving towards full IP ownership by researchers and research teams. We have to help to grow these things here in the UK. As mentioned by the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds) and the hon. Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), we must use Government procurement to support UK tech. It has to be a catalyst for British sovereign tech. We are calling for a trial increase to 30% for the social value in procurement contracts. That would align with our strategic goals on digital sovereignty and AI, while maintaining open borders. When it comes to tackling the challenges head-on, we need to look seriously at the cyber-security threats that have been talked about today. The hon. Member for Poole talked about the impact of big tech companies, and Mythos was a wake-up call. We hear that China is now developing such models, but I am most worried about those we are not hearing about. We need to prepare for the future of work and fuel our creative industries, because we are nowhere without them. When it comes to NEETs, we have to realise that we are at a squeeze point, because companies are looking at how AI is bringing down costs. However, I would gently add that this is not the time to increase the cost of employment; that will not tackle the employment question. We need to look at establishing safety by design in AI systems and models. We must tackle harm from chatbots through a harm-based framework, but enforcement is crucial. The AI Safety Institute is now the AI Security Institute. It is such a shame that that focus has been diminished, because we should be looking at AI ethics, as well as safety and security. We have to ensure that AI systems are not used for harm. Members talked about AI fraud, which is a massive, serious problem in the UK. Revolut told us that the UK accounts for 22% of its customer base but 68% of its fraud costs. We are not tackling that massive problem properly, and AI is supercharging it. We are therefore calling for an online crime agency and AI labelling. We are also saying that social media companies, where a lot of AI-enabled fraud starts, should be financially liable for it. We must tackle the energy question for AI datacentres and their role in the community, which my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dunbartonshire (Susan Murray) mentioned. We have to make sure they add value to our communities, and the AI Energy Council must tackle those issues head-on. On public services, we need to make sure a person stays in the loop. Ultimately, we need to prepare for a future that is arriving very quickly. Underpinning that, we are calling for a national people strategy. Things are changing very quickly, so we need a single, coherent framework, from primary school to the workplace, with regional input. We must realise that the skills we need for an AI future are not just technical skills, but critical thinking and analysis. We must also look at a digital sovereignty strategy, as many Members have said. We need to look at our tech stack to ensure that we do not have a single point of failure. A resilient tech stack would be good not just for our security and for businesses, but for our tech and our economy, so we absolutely need to look at that. We cannot give up on frontier models; we need to start looking at them now. A point was made about proportionality in models. We do not all need massive, complex models that require massive amounts of energy to solve most of our problems. Most companies probably need simple models. They can be UK models, but if we do not start now by backing and investing in them, we will be left behind very quickly. Finally, we need to move quicky on smart regulation. The Financial Conduct Authority has a fantastic approach to fintech that looks at output and standards. We need a flexible approach to AI, because things are moving quickly. We also need a digital Bill of rights. We need to unlock the benefits by addressing the challenges head-on. According to the Ada Lovelace Institute, 91% of the public feel that it is important that AI systems are developed and used in ways that treat people fairly, and almost 90% are calling for an independent regulator for AI. Will the Minister listen to those concerns, take back the many great ideas that have been raised today and speak to his colleagues across Departments? AI is an extremely powerful tool, and we must embrace it. The Government must tackle this head-on. Where will they let the power be focused? If anyone is unsure how quickly AI is going to change, I am repeatedly reminded that this year is the slowest we will ever see in AI development. If a plane going around the world is 1° off, it will be 500 miles off course. We need to decide now the direction we are going in with AI. We need to look at that holistically. We are here to support that Government work and make sure it empowers society, so that Britain can really be the leading nation on trustworthy, innovative technology.
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Draft Trade (Mobile Roaming) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. The Liberal Democrats support this SI. This is about working with EEA and EFTA, and it is a reminder of the benefits to consumers when we work together with our European partners, whether that is working on our phone bills or on defence. Does the Minister agree, in relation to the Liberal Democrats’ proposals for a new growth and defence partnership with the EU, looking at the single market and a new customs union, that this is a strong reminder that working together would make us richer, safer and stronger?
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Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I thank the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for securing a debate on a question that will shape every community in this country, including mine. I will try to focus on topics that have not been covered, including infrastructure. In my Mid Dunbartonshire constituency, AI has recently been brought to the forefront of local debate. At Westerhill, near Bishopbriggs, a developer has proposed a 300 MW AI data centre with 500 MW of battery storage—nationally significant infrastructure on our doorstep. My constituents’ response has rightly been one of caution—not hostility and not blind welcome. They have serious concerns and questions: “What jobs will this bring, and for whom? What happens to the environment, to the grid, to water and to energy bills?” Developments on this scale must be good neighbours and deliver community benefit that people can see, as well as skills, local employment and investment in the places that host them—not just high fences and, as the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed) said, profits that are disseminated at a distance. That is how they will be judged by the communities who host them. This is an international issue, and it has so far been dominated by US policy. Last month, the United States showed the first sign that it may not see us as being part of its team when it comes to AI access. On 12 June, the US Government ordered one of the US’s leading AI companies to cut off access to its two most advanced models for anyone who is not a US citizen—the first time that export controls have ever been applied to AI models. Access for British businesses and researchers was switched off overnight not because of anything we did, but because Trump decided to cut us off. That is not a partnership; a vital technology that can be withdrawn at another Government’s whim is a chain around Britain’s neck. We cannot build our public services, our security and our economy on systems that can be cut off at a whim. It is clear that the UK must build its sovereign capacity—the data centres, skills and software needed to ensure that we are not locked out of the AI race. Communities such as mine, which are being asked to host the infrastructure of that future, should share fairly in the rewards, and we must build public trust. The Liberal Democrat approach would make that possible, based on a cross-sector, principle-based framework to give innovators certainty and the public confidence, and to give transparency wherever AI is used in the public sector, so that people can understand the impact it is having on their lives.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
I beg to move, That this House has considered defibrillators in police vehicles. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. I am delighted to have secured this debate on defibrillators in the back of police vehicles. I have been pushing for this for some time, and it is helpful that the debate is taking place on International Paramedics Day, when we celebrate the work of people who intervene to save lives. I pay tribute to Naomi Rees-Issitt, who tragically lost her son Jay on new year’s day 2022. Jay was unlucky in a number of ways. He was unlucky to have a cardiac arrest at the age of 18. He was extremely unlucky that the defibrillator that could have saved his life was only two minutes away, locked behind the gates of a school. His friends who were with him supported him with cardiopulmonary resuscitation, but he was unlucky that the ambulance was significantly delayed. Jay was unlucky that there was a stabbing incident in Coventry that evening, which meant that many ambulances had been relocated to deal with that incident. Jay was also unlucky that there was a backlog of patients being unloaded from ambulances at the nearest hospital, which, again, resulted in delays to intervention for his cardiac arrest. The ambulance arrived 24 minutes after Jay’s collapse. Sadly, it was too late. The police vehicle turned up 14 minutes after his collapse, however. According to the coroner, it was a one-in-a-million situation: if there had been intervention with a defibrillator at that point, Jay would have recovered from his cardiac arrest. That demonstrates the need for defibrillators in the back of response vehicles. They could have a serious impact, saving hundreds of lives up and down the United Kingdom.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
I have raised that very issue with Devon and Cornwall constabulary. Following an awful incident, a grieving mother is trying to ensure that we have stab kits across the United Kingdom. As I am sure my hon. Friend has done, I have corresponded with Avon and Somerset police on this issue. Bleed kits can save lives. I have had conversations with the security staff who support us. It is quite shocking to learn what they have in their bags in case there is an incident at an MP’s constituency surgery or another event. Such measures should not be focused solely on people like us; we need to make sure that there are opportunities to support people out in the community. Going back to the serious issue of cardiac arrests, the medical evidence shows that for every minute without intervention, there is a 10% reduction in survival for individuals.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
The hon. Member makes a valuable point. Resuscitation Council UK highlights that if there is an intervention within three to five minutes, the chances of survival are between 50% and 70%. It really is all about timing and how we can significantly impact that. A survey that the all-party parliamentary group for defibrillators undertook with all police forces across the country found that less than 10% of response vehicles have defibrillators as standard. That is really disturbing, because the police are often the first on the scene, as was the case with Jay. Naomi’s Our Jay charity has done stellar work in assisting both Bedfordshire and Warwickshire police to get defibrillators in a number of their vehicles. That had an immediate impact on saving lives. Within days of them being put in the back of vehicles, there was clear evidence of the impact they made. I hope the Minister will take that into account. Another important element is that when mapping out where defibrillators are in communities, we often find they are in more affluent areas. The more deprived communities have fewer defibrillators, for whatever reason.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
The police are so often the first on the scene. It ends up being a postcode lottery, whether it is because of communities are rural, coastal or more deprived. I say to the Minister that by getting defibrillators in the back of police response vehicles, we will remove some of that postcode lottery from the system, because the police would be there to support people in their hour of need. They will also have the tools to support people more powerfully, rather than simply being able to undertake CPR. That will be a massive change for people. I have talked to a local Devon charity called Jay’s Aim, which offers support across the south-west of England. It undertakes training for community groups on this issue and provides boxes in towns where people can access defibrillators. It shared with me that a number of the defibrillators boxes are, for good reason, hammered by the police. When the police go to an incident that may need a defibrillator, they quite rightly grab and use the one in a box near the police station. The charity has to replace loads of pads as a result. If that is not a canary in the coalmine, showing that there is a need for our policing service to be equipped with defibrillators in all response vehicles, I do not know what is. In conclusion, I hope the Minister will ensure that we take the luck out of these situations and, through public policy, make real changes that impact on people’s lives. I am aware that in response to a written question on 27 April she said she was considering the pros and cons of providing defibrillators in the back of police vehicles, and would set out next steps. I hope she will use this debate to clearly set out some of those steps. I encourage her to ensure that it is not just standard but mandatory for all police response vehicles to have defibrillators.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
I thank the Minister for allowing me to quiz her further. Can she expand on that point? Is the pushback from the National Police Chiefs’ Council, from lower levels within policing or from Government Ministers? Anyone can use a defibrillator, because it walks them through it. This is not about additional training on how to use defibrillators; it is about the availability of defibrillators where there is a crisis. Defibrillators need to be in the right place at the right time, and I cannot think of a better place than the boot of a police car.
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Defibrillators in Police Vehicles
I know timescales are tricky, but can the Minister provide some rough timescales on the different steps? I understand that the new national police force and procurement are a bit more distant, but can she tell us what timescales she is working to, at least on the first steps she alluded to?
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
In my discussions with coastguards in Torbay, they have shared the full spectrum of their activities. One of the most disturbing and harrowing is the recovery of dead bodies—not only where humans or pets may have gone over the edge of a cliff, but where people have died from drowning. That may be an accident or a suicide, and it will leave emotional scars on the officers. Does the Minister agree that choosing not to financially compensate people who undertake work that many of us would find really difficult is nothing short of an insult?
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin) for making this debate happen. I have been to see his bookshelves and, trust me, the books on strategy and military affairs in his library are well thumbed. He knows what he is talking about, and he has done well to corral us all into talking about it today. Let me begin by talking about defence spending. It is fair to say that others have covered it, but I will repeat the fact that we are not spending sufficiently on defence. I want to challenge the hon. Member for Alloa and Grangemouth (Brian Leishman). He did a bold thing in challenging the prevailing consensus, the mood of the House, and views that are now quite mainstream in the House, but while it is compelling to think about all the welfare need that exists in this country—and I acknowledge that there is a great deal—he has a crude oil refinery in his constituency.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
Forgive me, but I understood that Grangemouth was a crude oil refinery. We need only look to Eurasia—we need only look at what has been happening in Ukraine and Russia—to see that war comes to those who do not really want it to come to them at all. Yes, that is a failure of diplomacy, but it is also a failure of preparedness. Today, I will focus my remarks on the business of readiness. We are currently spending 2.5% of GDP on defence, and the target is 3.5% by 2035. We really ought to be getting midway between those two by 2030, yet we are projected to be at only 2.68% by then. Of course, the Prime Minister is currently at the NATO summit in Ankara. Nye Bevan said to the Labour conference in 1957 that his party members should not send him “naked into the conference chamber”, and I fear that the Prime Minister has been sent naked into the Ankara conference chamber. The defence investment plan is indeed a skinny dip. The hon. Member for Stevenage (Kevin Bonavia) talked about the famous “King and country” debate at the Oxford Union in 1933. I completely agree with him that people who thought that they would not fight for King and country in 1933 found that, by 1939, they had no choice but to do so because of the circumstances. He knows a great deal about that from his time on the NATO Parliamentary Assembly.
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Rearmament and Warfighting Readiness
The shadow Minister is exactly right. Of course, those people’s parents fought in the first world war. They were a generation who really did not want to meet war, but war came to them none the less. Clausewitz, the philosopher of war, talked about government, military and people being the remarkable trinity concerned with war. A lot of today’s debate has centred on the military, on defence, on procurement, and perhaps a little on government as it pertains to policy. We have talked a bit less about people, although the hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) did talk about our servicepeople. I want to add to that by talking about people in the country more broadly—the people we represent. We need to think about defence as a national endeavour that builds on everyone’s understanding of the threat and the need to defend the nation. When we discuss warfighting readiness, we are talking about not just platforms, ships, tanks and aircraft, but information. The Foreign Affairs Committee published a report on disinformation. We talked about the use of military and non-military—overt and covert—methods to blur the lines between war and peace, to sow doubt in the minds of target populations, and to destabilise and undermine societies. Last year’s strategic defence review covers sub-threshold attacks, and it talks about how such attacks are difficult to attribute to a perpetrator with certainty due to the methods used and the frequent reliance on proxy actors. The focus has to be on countering Russia’s hostile activities in the information space, as well as thinking about preparing to fight a war and have war readiness, because that is the reality of modern conflict. Conflict does not necessarily begin when a missile is fired or a border is crossed. It can begin when public trust is systemically eroded, when elections are manipulated, when information is weaponised or when hostile actors succeed in weakening a society’s confidence in its own institutions. The objective is often not mere propaganda or the spreading of false information, but to persuade societies that a particular lie is true. The aim is to persuade people that objective truth no longer exists. I want us to think about war readiness in the round, including in the information space.
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Greenhouse Gas Removals Sector
In recognising the challenge of planting enough trees on the land, I wonder whether my hon. Friend has thought more about capturing carbon in the ocean. He and I share the Lyme Bay marine protected area in our constituencies. The Vision Group for Sidmouth was telling me that despite covering less than 1% of the ocean floor, seagrass beds are responsible for 15% of its total carbon capture. Does he agree that we can also look to the sea for the capture of carbon?
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National Youth Strategy
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Ms McVey. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Harpreet Uppal) for securing this important debate and I also pay tribute to all the other Members who have spoken in it for making really excellent speeches. Some very compelling points were made about the value and importance of youth services and youth enrichment. I have no doubt that many in this Chamber share my core belief that every child and young person has some innate and special talent and ability in them, and that it is our job as families and as a wider society, through both the formal and informal support that we put in place, to draw out that talent and ensure that every young person grows up to thrive and contribute to our society and our economy. Youth services and youth enrichment are a key part of that, including, of course, the Duke of Edinburgh’s award, which celebrates its 70th anniversary this year. It has helped so many young people to improve their skills and has equipped them to make valuable contributions to their communities and societies. I congratulate all the young people across the country, and especially in my constituency of Twickenham, who have completed their bronze, silver or gold awards. I also offer huge thanks to all those people who give up their time to make the awards happen. I know some very hard-working teachers who give up their weekends to go camping and do all sorts of crazy things in all weathers. I am awestruck by them. I certainly would never do that, but I am not a camper. I thank all of them. These experiences not only change individual lives, but strengthen our communities. Through volunteering in the community and completing expeditions, young people are countering the rising tide of isolation. Last year alone, young people participating in the Duke of Edinburgh’s award contributed to an impressive 6 million hours of volunteering, with an estimated value of £45.4 million. A number of Members have mentioned Alan Milburn’s recent report on young people not in employment, education or training, and the scale of the challenge that we face. It is important that we challenge the narrative we hear all too often that young people are disengaged, lazy or selfish. Actually, they are anything but. This generation is growing up in an online world shaped by economic uncertainty, mental health challenges, rapid technological change and concerns about the future of our planet but, time and again, young people show us their determination, creativity and drive, especially when they are given the space and support to thrive. The Liberal Democrats have long campaigned for a fair and long-term funding settlement to support youth work, resources and infrastructure. We very much welcome the Government’s national youth strategy, particularly their promise to introduce multi-year funding settlements and halve the participation gap in enrichment activities between disadvantaged young people and their peers by 2035. I note, however, the recent YMCA report, which found that spending on youth services by local authorities in England and Wales fell by 10% in a single year, in the largest annual reduction since 2016-17. At the same time, we know that children from lower income backgrounds have less access to enrichment activities outside school, and that schools are facing tighter budgets than ever. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation reported that almost one in five schools has cut back and stopped enrichment activities and clubs in order to provide support for pupils experiencing hardship. I also draw the Minister’s attention to a briefing from the Duke of Edinburgh’s award, which notes the vital role that education providers play in successfully implementing enrichment targets, especially in the light of some of the cuts we have seen in youth services. With both schools and youth providers stretched to the limit, the Government’s ambitions will be challenged. Achieving them will depend on practical support, sustainable funding and capacity. We have already seen concerns emerging in West Sussex, where the county council has decided to stop centrally commissioning the award, leaving many schools unable to meet the administrative costs themselves. I would be grateful if the Minister could share whether she is aware of similar situations arising elsewhere in the country. I am keen to understand what discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Education on the ask from the Duke of Edinburgh’s award for 80 hours of enrichment per year for every young person. As we have heard, the evidence for investment is compelling. We know that enrichment activities can help to improve school attendance, and we have heard about the return on investment from youth services, reducing pressure on other public services. Without funding certainty beyond the three years currently promised, we know that youth organisations will struggle to run consistent programmes. [Interruption.] I am being asked to wind up, so I will just reiterate that the consequences of under-investment are clear and youth services are not an optional extra. The Liberal Democrats stand ready to collaborate with the Government to ensure that the right investment goes in for our young people and their future.
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Troubles Legacy: Legislation
Back in March, the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) travelled to Belfast to address the Alliance party conference. In his speech, he warned that “it is too easy for the powers-that-be to write their own rules and cover up”. He was talking about the need for a Hillsborough law, which he said at the time “is currently stalled in Parliament due to an unacceptably wide carve-out for the security services.” We on the Liberal Democrat Benches are deeply concerned that exactly that issue now confronts veterans, who, under this Government’s draft troubles Bill, are exposed to investigation and prosecution while the state that gave the orders shelters behind similar carve-outs. Will the Secretary of State confirm whether he will support the Lib Dem amendment to the Bill requiring that any decision to block disclosure on national security grounds is referred to the Intelligence and Security Committee to ensure proper parliamentary scrutiny?
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European Entry and Exit System
Despite the unholy alliance between the Minister and Members on the Tory Front Bench, this issue is clearly a product of Brexit. I visited Dover with the Home Affairs Committee last week. Dover has invested more than £40 million in infrastructure, but the software is not working, and there will be chaos unless the EES is suspended this summer. This is a Brexit dividend, but will the Minister emphasise to the French that, rather than enjoying the schadenfreude, they should know how much their economy will be damaged by the chaos that will ensue?
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if she will make a statement on the management of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and proposed changes to payments made to coastguard rescue officers.
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Maritime and Coastguard Agency
Through you, Madam Deputy Speaker, I thank Mr Speaker for allowing me the opportunity to ask this urgent question today, and I thank the Minister for his answer. As he knows, last week, we had more than 30 Members in Westminster Hall for a debate on these changes. I am pleased to hear that as a result of his intervention, the check-in meetings were postponed, and that the matters are now under full consideration. Is the Department considering the possibility of legislative change to deal with this problem? The House goes into recess at the end of next week, so can the Minister give the House an undertaking that those check-in meetings and this process of change will not be resumed during the recess, and without a statement first being made to this House? Since last week’s debate, I have been contacted by a number of full-time officers who have described to me a toxic management culture within the agency. I have been told of at least three whistleblowing complaints that were made to the Department in March. Despite the passage of time, the whistleblowers remain unclear about the progress of their complaints. Can the Minister give me some reassurance that those whistleblowing complaints will be properly and speedily investigated, and that a proper and independent investigation will now be initiated into the management culture within the Maritime and Coastguard Agency? Finally, information obtained under a Freedom of Information Act release indicates that responses to the MCA’s own survey show that almost 40% of CROs would either reduce the number of call-outs to which they respond or leave the service completely. That contradicts what Members of this House were told by the MCA. Can the Minister please explain why this information was not disclosed voluntarily by the agency? Will he now fully disclose the outcome of that survey?