International Terrorism

Part of Defence – in the House of Commons at on 20 September 2021.

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Photo of Ben Wallace Ben Wallace The Secretary of State for Defence

The reduction in conflict, stability and security funding, which is effectively what the hon. Gentleman is referring to, is partly because if it were to continue it could end up in the hands of the Taliban. Given that the fall of Afghanistan was happening, I do not think that that would have been a wise thing for anyone to do. Secondly, he should not rule out the fact that counter-terrorism funding both for here and abroad has increased significantly since 2015, with well over 30% of funding both to civilians such as the police and the intelligence services and to special forces and the armed forces. The direction of travel is increasing not decreasing and the capability that we are procuring, including the drones that we have recently signed up to, will give us extra capability that we did not have all those years ago in 2001.