Integrated Review - Statement

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 7:26 pm on 17th March 2021.

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Photo of Lord Hamilton of Epsom Lord Hamilton of Epsom Conservative 7:26 pm, 17th March 2021

My Lords, I congratulate the Government on an integrated review that brings together all the assets that this country has and uses them to give us a direction of where we should be going in the future. But does my noble friend not share my concern that, at the same time as increasing the defence budget, we are actually reducing the number of servicemen? This might have been something of an answer to the noble Lord, Lord Ricketts. The British Army and our Armed Forces have been involved in low-intensity warfare in recent active service conflicts, and it seems to me that we are highly likely to have more of these in the future. Is it right to reduce the number of men who might be involved in this?