I want to write to Danny Kruger
Danny Kruger: It is an honour to take part in this debate. I pay tribute to the Defence Committee and the Public Accounts Committee for what I agree are exceptionally good reports. I echo my right hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) on that point. This is possibly the most important speech I will give as an MP, and I do so on behalf of the military in my constituency...
Danny Kruger: ...more. It was 50% of GDP in world war two, so the figures we are talking about are essentially marginal in light of the potential. The point has been made—it cannot be made enough—that before defence gets more money, it needs to spend its own money better. I echo the points made about the importance of procurement reform. The Public Accounts Committee report is damning. There is a £17...
Danny Kruger: I defer to those on the Front Bench on what transparency is appropriate, but I recognise the point made in the hon. Lady’s Committee’s report and I think in the Defence Committee report about the difficulty of getting the information that the Committees need to do their work. I recognise that nuclear is identified as a separate line in the budget and is protected in theory, but I am...
Danny Kruger: I thank my right hon. Friend for that. If we managed to get the genuine increase in defence spending that is needed, the question then arises of how to spend that and where the money should go. I say this not just on behalf of the 20,000 or so defence personnel in Wiltshire, but because it is the right thing to do: we need to put people first. I recognise that there has been a significant...
Danny Kruger: ...the challenge that the Committees have had in identifying what our capabilities are, and the tasks that Ministers set for them, because we cannot always know exactly what those threats are, with defence planning assumptions now classified. Nevertheless, I echo a point made by the right hon. Member for North Durham: I am delighted about AUKUS, which is a tremendous step forward in our...
Danny Kruger: It is an honour to take part in this debate. I pay tribute to the Defence Committee and the Public Accounts Committee for what I agree are exceptionally good reports. I echo my right hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) on that point. This is possibly the most important speech I will give as an MP, and I do so on behalf of the military in my constituency...
Danny Kruger: ...more. It was 50% of GDP in world war two, so the figures we are talking about are essentially marginal in light of the potential. The point has been made—it cannot be made enough—that before defence gets more money, it needs to spend its own money better. I echo the points made about the importance of procurement reform. The Public Accounts Committee report is damning. There is a £17...
Danny Kruger: I defer to those on the Front Bench on what transparency is appropriate, but I recognise the point made in the hon. Lady’s Committee’s report and I think in the Defence Committee report about the difficulty of getting the information that the Committees need to do their work. I recognise that nuclear is identified as a separate line in the budget and is protected in theory, but I am...
Danny Kruger: I thank my right hon. Friend for that. If we managed to get the genuine increase in defence spending that is needed, the question then arises of how to spend that and where the money should go. I say this not just on behalf of the 20,000 or so defence personnel in Wiltshire, but because it is the right thing to do: we need to put people first. I recognise that there has been a significant...
Danny Kruger: ...the challenge that the Committees have had in identifying what our capabilities are, and the tasks that Ministers set for them, because we cannot always know exactly what those threats are, with defence planning assumptions now classified. Nevertheless, I echo a point made by the right hon. Member for North Durham: I am delighted about AUKUS, which is a tremendous step forward in our...
Danny Kruger: It is an honour to take part in this debate. I pay tribute to the Defence Committee and the Public Accounts Committee for what I agree are exceptionally good reports. I echo my right hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) on that point. This is possibly the most important speech I will give as an MP, and I do so on behalf of the military in my constituency...
Danny Kruger: ...more. It was 50% of GDP in world war two, so the figures we are talking about are essentially marginal in light of the potential. The point has been made—it cannot be made enough—that before defence gets more money, it needs to spend its own money better. I echo the points made about the importance of procurement reform. The Public Accounts Committee report is damning. There is a £17...
Danny Kruger: I defer to those on the Front Bench on what transparency is appropriate, but I recognise the point made in the hon. Lady’s Committee’s report and I think in the Defence Committee report about the difficulty of getting the information that the Committees need to do their work. I recognise that nuclear is identified as a separate line in the budget and is protected in theory, but I am...
Danny Kruger: I thank my right hon. Friend for that. If we managed to get the genuine increase in defence spending that is needed, the question then arises of how to spend that and where the money should go. I say this not just on behalf of the 20,000 or so defence personnel in Wiltshire, but because it is the right thing to do: we need to put people first. I recognise that there has been a significant...
Danny Kruger: ...the challenge that the Committees have had in identifying what our capabilities are, and the tasks that Ministers set for them, because we cannot always know exactly what those threats are, with defence planning assumptions now classified. Nevertheless, I echo a point made by the right hon. Member for North Durham: I am delighted about AUKUS, which is a tremendous step forward in our...
Danny Kruger: ...particularly through the WorkWell programme. I finish with a plea on behalf of Wiltshire and the whole country. More than anything, I regret the Budget’s slow and frankly insignificant uplift in defence spending. It is a good thing that more money is now going into the defence budget, and I welcome the commitments that have been made in recent Budgets, but the increase of less than 1% in...
Danny Kruger: ..., but there is something regrettable about the way this Bill has developed. There was a good moment when, in response to pressure from their lordships, the Government proposed to introduce a new defence against Equality Act harassment, whereby it should be possible to defend a suit on the grounds that there was no intention to injure the injured party, and merely overheard conversations...
Danny Kruger: ...China. In the Government amendments, and in Government policy in general, we see a necessary new realism in UK policy. Security is the new watchword of our times, and to me it means much more than defence against hostile states. We face all sorts of other threats to our security, including, as my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight mentioned, our extreme dependence on supply chains...
Danny Kruger: ..., but here we have 50 or so Opposition Members choosing to spend their time debating this question. Does my right hon. Friend think—[Interruption.] We are here because we have been called out in defence of the Government. Does the Minister think that their constituents will be proud of the way their representatives are using their time?
Danny Kruger: ...time, and I suggest that we did not leave the EU just to subject ourselves to a new supranational arrangement in the form of the WHO. Some may find that comparison ludicrous, as they find any defence of national sovereignty ludicrous—accept in the case of Scotland. They say that in our interconnected world we need less sovereignty and more co-operation, which means more power for people...