Nuclear Disarmament — Debate

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 12:20 pm on 21 January 2010.

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Photo of Lord Robertson of Port Ellen Lord Robertson of Port Ellen Labour 12:20, 21 January 2010

This is an important and urgent issue. I commend the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, for his initiative in persuading his fellow Cross-Benchers to devote some of their scarce time to a matter of such urgency. I came into politics demonstrating for unilateral nuclear disarmament at the Holy Loch when the American nuclear submarines arrived in 1961. When I told President Bush that in the Oval Office in the White House he was a bit aghast: he did not realise that the Secretary-General of NATO had had that kind of background. However, as we were the same age, born in 1946, he did a quick mental calculation and figured that he was, as he said, "raising hell" at that time and did not wish to be reminded of what he was doing, so we would put that aside.

I moved from demonstrating at the gates of Ardnadam Pier on the Holy Loch to being in charge of Britain's independent nuclear deterrent because, along the line, I changed my mind about unilateralism. I did it slightly before my noble friend Lord Kinnock, whose Damascus conversion at a National Executive Committee meeting will remain in the memories of anybody who was at that meeting. The line was, "I have tried to preach unilateralism in the Kremlin, in the White House and in the Elysée and I have to tell you, comrades,"-that word was used quite commonly in those days-"it doesn't work". So the Labour Party moved away from its almost suicidal unilateralist policy. However, I believe that disarmament is important and relevant and that proliferation poses a huge threat to the world today. I am delighted, therefore, to be among a group of colleagues, in this House and the other one, who are committed, in the Top Level Group of UK Parliamentarians for Multilateral Nuclear Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, to be moving towards a position where we can at last welcome a world without nuclear weapons.

We have very limited time in this debate, so I just want to make three points. One is that we undervalue the progress that has already been made in nuclear disarmament and that some of the non-nuclear states, in undervaluing the progress that has been made, dismiss their own role and their own obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is worth reminding ourselves that the disarmament record of the P3 group of nuclear nations has been impressive. By 2012, the United States will have reduced its nuclear stockpiles by 75 per cent of the level of 1990. France has reduced the number of its warheads by 50 per cent since the height of the Cold War and has eliminated its land-based missiles. Our country has reduced the explosive power of its nuclear arsenal by 75 per cent since the end of the Cold War, reduced the number of its operationally available warheads to no more that 160 and done away with all the non-strategic nuclear weapons as well. Russia itself has sharply cut back on its strategic nuclear forces, reducing from approximately 15,000 to 3,900 since 1986, although it has to be said that it has deployed a large arsenal of non-strategic nuclear forces which I shall address in a moment.

The START negotiations that are taking place at the moment look likely to produce even further reductions in American and Russian nuclear arms. So it is important for the non-nuclear states in the run-up to the NPT review conference to bear in mind the fact that the nuclear nations have made improvements and that they have obligations as well in terms of creating the conditions necessary for implementation, for preventing further nuclear proliferation and for securing nuclear weapons and material as well as encouraging the peaceful use of nuclear energy. These are important matters that should be borne in mind before the NPT conference.

Finally, there is an opportunity in the lead-up to the review conference to look at theatre nuclear weapons, the preponderance of which, in Europe, are Russian. However, there is an opportunity here of trying to negotiate the levels of these short-range nuclear weapons to a point where they cease to be relevant and remain purely symbolic. But this must be done carefully and with imagination. It is a new opportunity for NATO to begin a dialogue and a negotiation with the Russians in order to relieve the European continent of some of these pretty redundant but symbolically very important weapons. There are opportunities involved in the process leading up to the review conference and I hope that we grab these opportunities quickly and wisely.