Orders of the Day — Western European Union

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 7:59 am on 10 March 1988.

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Photo of Mr David Mellor Mr David Mellor , Putney 7:59, 10 March 1988

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Mr. Hill)—I do not say that as a platitude; I know that it is always said, but I really mean it—for coming in this morning and speaking with such good humour and good sense. I very much enjoyed his speech and thought that he hit the centre of the target on most of the issues that he raised. That is not surprising, because he has enormous experience in this field. As he said, he has been associated with WEU for nearly 10 years, and his partnership with my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Sir G. Finsberg), the new leader of the Conservative group in WEU, bodes well for the future. It is clear that the attempts that we are all making to give WEU a more central role can succeed only if all parts of WEU are able to carry the strain of upgrading their efforts.

My hon. Friend has very properly made some points that the Council of Ministers will have to think about, and plainly we in the United Kingdom in particular will have to think about when we assume the presidency of WEU, as we shall be doing in the next few months.

It is equally necessary that the parliamentary arm of WEU should be vigorous. I was extremely impressed when I went out to speak to one of the last parliamentary sessions by how good the attendance was and, in particular, by the enthusiasm of the British Members from all parties. They attended the plenary meetings in strength, but there was also an almost 100 per cent. turnout for the briefings afterwards. I thought that the enthusiasm that people brought to bear there boded very well for the future, as did the willigness of all concerned to listen to speeches that were intended to be challenging—certainly my own contribution was—because, plainly, if WEU is to be relevant, we shall have to talk frankly about a number of quite difficult issues and one or two people's sacred cows might have to have a knife put into them. But more of that later.

My hon. Friend made a good point when he talked about the vital nature of the relationship between the United States and Europe. In no sense is WEU intended to displace the United States contribution in Europe. It is intended to be a forum within which the European pillar of NATO can discuss sensibly and coherently what we need to do to ensure that we are living up to our commitments. When one looks at the population of Europe as against the population of the United States, and the increasing narrowing of the gap in gross domestic product between Europe and the United States, it is not hard to understand why there are voices in the Congress and elsewhere calling on Europeans to accept a greater share of the burden of common defence. If we are to maintain a strong Alliance, as my hon. Friend made clear, we must heed those voices and respond to their call. That is the challenge to us and we are ready to accept it.

We are all the more ready to accept it after a highly successful NATO summit, for which, of course, we have to pay the warmest tribute to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, whose idea it was and whose role in ensuring that the statement that came out at the end was firm and principled was, as everyone acknowledged, paramount.

We must not just talk about political solidarity; we must take practical steps to do more. We can do so against the background of an already considerable contribution within Europe to Europe's defence. My hon. Friend exposed facts that he said were not well enough known, and it can never be repeated too often that of NATO's forces in Europe we provide from Europe 90 per cent. of the total manpower, 85 per cent. of the tanks, 95 per cent. of the artillery, 80 per cent. of the combat aircraft and 70 per cent. of the fighting ships in the eastern Atlantic and the Channel. Although my hon. Friend is right to say that not every country takes pride in the size of its defence budget, overall we in Europe spend about $110 billion a year on defence, which is 30 per cent. more in real terms than our spending in 1971.

Not only need we spend money—because we must not fall into the trap of thinking that the answer to any point is to say how much money one spends—for we as a party, and I hope all the Governments of Western Europe, are not interested in just signing a cheque. We want value for money. We must see what we are getting out of it. That is where the expertise about which my hon. Friend spoke is crucial, for it is necessary for us to have, for instance, more collaborative ventures between armament industries in our different countries. We must reduce duplication, produce new equipment more cost-effectively, and the commonality of equipment must be increased for all the reasons my hon. Friend gave.

Twenty collaborative programmes have been instituted by the' Independent European Programme Group since 1984. We are currently involved in 12 of those equipment projects, and at the same time the members of NATO's integrated military structure have been co-operating in implementing the conventional defence improvements initiative, which is intended to increase the operating effectiveness of our forces by improving, for example, their communications systems, air defence, ammunition and fuel stocks, airlift capacity and so on. Also, we are much involved in the tail-to-teeth movement. Since 1979, 20,000 men have been transferred from the support area to the front line and the reserves have been increased by 50,000.

We also want to encourage the two members of NATO which remain outside the integrated military structure—France and Spain—to extend their forces in support of the Alliance. We have put a number of suggestions to the French in recent months for ways in which we might all work together.

I do not want my hon. Friend to become restive because I appreciate that he was talking about WEU and I have spent a lot of time talking about NATO. But we must set the work of WEU in a framework, and the essential framework is in a complementary role to NATO but with specific tasks that it can do and perhaps NATO cannot. That is why the decision was taken a few years ago to breathe life back into WEU, a decision which, as my hon. Friend said, has promise but is an agenda and not an achievement so far, though there are achievements. I accept the stimulus he is putting on us to try to ensure that during our presidency we make progress.

What, then, is the role of WEU? Political solidarity is vital in all this because a Europe which can get its own ideas straight and speak with one voice must be a more rewarding partner for the United States and a more effective alliance in general. So the European pillar must have a way in which it can determine these issues, not so as to exclude the United States but to allow us to respond constructively to the challenge that, as I say, is properly thrown out from time to time by Congress. There are ways, which have already been found, in which political solidarity can he developed, and the WEU platform provides a yardstick by which all members can measure their development in security and judge their own interests and requirements.

WEU can also provide a forum in which its members can discuss how to confront together threats posed to their shared interests outside the North Atlantic treaty area. My hon. Friend drew attention to the co-operation by WEU in the Gulf. I need not add to that. I endorse what he said. It is encouraging evidence of what can be achieved within WEU and which, to be frank, could not have been achieved if WEU had not existed because it provided vital cover for some of our European friends to get involved. If that cover had not been available, they might not have done so. Thus, WEU can excel as a forum in which members can concert their views on vital issues and as a focus for the discussion of practical defence co-operation, for this must not be pie in the sky; these must be practical issues, as my hon. Friend pointed out.

I conclude by dealing with the two points my hon. Friend said we had to try to resolve in the coming months—colocation and enlargement. On colocation, all the members are agreed that if the organisation is to fulfil its active new role, the elements in London and Paris must be brought together. I am afraid that it has not yet been conclusively decided where. It remains our view that the best place for this would be Brussels because of the proximity of NATO and the EEC.

On enlargement, Ministers agreed in October that they would examine with a favourable predisposition the possibility of accession to WEU by Spain and Portugal. This remains the case, and that matter will be resumed at our meeting next month. Obviously I cannot say how it will turn out, but I have taken on board the points that my hon. Friend has made.

This is a timely debate. We are about to embark on our presidency, and I can assure my hon. Friend that his ideas will be taken fully into account as we plan our agenda for the next 12 months.