Defence

Part of Bill Presented – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 13 March 1978.

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Photo of Mr Julian Critchley Mr Julian Critchley , Aldershot 12:00, 13 March 1978

The hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Allaun) is including in the NATO forces the Greeks and the Turks. They are nowhere near the central front of Europe, and with the best will in the world, they could not be called upon to reinforce our forces in this area.

There is no visible end to the process of Soviet rearmament. It is not necessary to remind the public of the extent of the Soviet build-up. We cannot have failed to have heard the warnings. Generals, politicions and journalists have all been telling us the strength of Soviet forces and the growing strength of their armaments. On the central front their armaments are numerically superior in a ratio of 3 to 1, and their artillery in a ratio of 6 to 1. The quality of Warsaw Pact equipment rivals that of NATO. Soviet rearmament is the most uncomfortable fact of international life. The group of Soviet armies in Germany is poised like a huge arrow at the coalition of allied armies.

I wish to carry the Government with me. Do I overstate the nature of the threat? If so, I would be happy to give way to the Government Front Bench. Clearly, it has not been overstated. In fact it has been understated.

Had it been overstated it would have been reasonably asserted that defence spending was adequate to the task. It has not been so asserted. Dr. Luns does not think so, neither does General Haig. The President of the United States was the first to ask the NATO Powers to increase their defence spending by up to 3 per cent, in order to meet the growing Soviet threat. This Government have agreed to increase their spending by 3 per cent., whatever that means. It means that the British Government no longer believe that British defence spending is adequate.

We are left with the last two excuses. The first is that our effort compares favourably with that of our allies. One can compare this as a percentage of GNP—which is most favourable to the Government's case, although they carefully never compare like with like—or one can compare spending per head of population. Using the latter comparison, we now lag behind not only the United States, France and Germany but the Dutch, the Belgians and the Norwegians.

What is the truth? How should we measure the Government's failure? It is futile to determine defence spending on the basis of an arbitrary mathematical formula based on a GNP percentage. The aim should be to assess the nature of the threat and the resources other allies are making available, and then see what future contribution we can make.

One should bear in mind that these were the words of the Minister of State as reported in the Financial Times on 23rd September last year. He was seeking to answer a pamphlet on defence issued by the national executive of the Labour Party called "Sense about Defence". The Minister of State is at his best when defending collective security against the attacks of his neutralist colleagues. He might try doing it more often.

It is worth having another look at "Sense about Defence" if only to understand more fully the nature of the coalition that is the Labour Party. It calls for a cut of £1,000 million over and above the £9,900 million already lopped off the defence budget. Such a cut would make our contribution to NATO worthless. This enmity towards defence, to collective security, is a characteristic of the Tribune Group, to which about 80 Socialist Members of Parliament belong.

Perhaps the Minister of State would join me for a moment in speculating about the motives of the Tribune Group. What does it want to achieve? What sort of Britain does it want? I suspect that its members are the same people who were described somewhat unsympathetically by Hugh Gaitskell as a collection of neutralists, unilateralists and fellow travellers". When one opens "Sense about Defence" and sees that it has a foreword by the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo), one does not know whether to laugh or cry. The Tribune Group is mounting a threat to the sort of defence and foreign policy which the Labour Party has always stood for. We all know this, but what is so annoying is that its members are allowed to pretend to be either radicals in favour of spending less money, or moralists uniquely concerned with the wickedness of weapons. In fact, they are neither.