Hansard

No. We have previously mentioned the impact of the Trident programme on conventional defence spending, and I think that it would help if we were not spending the money on Trident. However, as Neil Findlay will know, we do not currently spend any money on defence, so our previous statement related to spending on conventional defence equipment in an independent Scotland. There are many other purposes for which the money could be used, and it would depend on the decisions of future Governments. That is how such things tend to be agreed.

About £1 billion of the £12 billion per annum that is being cut by the UK Government will impact directly on Scotland. That puts the UK Government’s priorities into sharp focus. On the one hand, it seems to be intent on committing billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money to a nuclear weapons system that can never be used, while on the other hand it is reducing by billions of pounds many of the benefits on which the people who are most in need currently rely.

Let us be absolutely clear about Trident: these are weapons of mass destruction. They are indiscriminate in that they kill and destroy everything in their path, and their use would bring untold humanitarian suffering and environmental damage, with the effects being felt across the world. There can be no surgical strike with a nuclear weapon; we would take out entire civilisations if we were to use some of the weapons that are currently available. In a previous debate, I noted the comments of the former Secretary of State for Defence, Des Browne, which are worth repeating today. He said that

“even a small-scale nuclear exchange ... would affect at least a billion people and usher in colder temperatures than at any time in the past millennium”.

I turn to the amendments. I do not propose to accept either the Conservative amendment, which seeks to continue our spending up to £167 billion on nuclear weapons, or the Green and Independent amendment. However, I propose to accept the Labour amendment because it is important that the chamber speaks as strongly as possible on the issue. In the past few days, a number of people have said that Scotland’s voice on the issue does not matter and is irrelevant—that we should not even be discussing such things. There is the possibility of a very early decision on Trident and there is no question about who will make that decision: it will be the UK Government, which is currently a Conservative Government. In that context, it is important that the Scottish Parliament speak as loudly as possible about how it feels about that expenditure on nuclear weapons. For that reason I propose to accept the Labour amendment, despite having some misgivings about it.

Chief among my misgivings about the Labour amendment is the fact that, for whatever reason, it seeks to knock out the reference to the implications for welfare spending in Scotland. Nevertheless, it rightly highlights the people who are currently employed in the industry and diversification. In all the debates on Trident that I have spoken in over a number of years, I have referred to diversification. I have also spoken with people in the trade union movement and the Labour Party about the need for diversification among the people who are currently employed in the industry. In my view, we have in the past missed huge opportunities to secure that diversification. In 1990, at the fall of the iron curtain, everyone was talking about the peace dividend, but we never saw it. We should have done. That was the time to downscale defence spending and to upscale spending on ensuring that people in the industry would be gainfully employed if they lost their jobs.

I hope that the Labour Party acknowledges that I propose to accept its amendment despite having reservations about it, because it is important that we speak with one voice on the issue. I also hope that, if we pass the motion, having accepted the Labour amendment, that will be not the end but the start of a process of campaigning against the abomination of spending up to £167 billion on ever more powerful nuclear weapons. I hope that we can campaign to change the mind of the UK Government by whatever means.

Members may have noted a report that appeared last month in The Daily Telegraph that suggested that a vote on the future of Trident could be held in the UK Parliament before the end of the year. It could happen in the next few weeks. The Scottish Government believes that the vote provides an opportunity for the UK Government and the UK Parliament to rethink their position on nuclear weapons—a stance that has not changed for almost 50 years.

In the Conservative amendment, it is interesting how much free thinking seems to be going on in certain sectors of the Conservative Party south of the border, but how slavishly adherent the Conservative Party in the Scottish Parliament is to the idea of more and more expensive nuclear weapons. I hope that that will change as a result of this debate. We believe that, in order to change the mind of the Conservative Party in the Scottish Parliament, the UK Government must be more transparent on the costs and consequences of spending on Trident. Perhaps that would happen if more Tory back benchers were aware of the costs and the Government was more open about the costs and consequences. Even before the latest increase, a third of the capital budget of the Royal Air Force, the Royal Navy and the Army was to be spent on nuclear weapons. That was before the cost went up to £167 billion.

The Pentagon has said that Britain cannot be both a nuclear power and an effective defence partner at the same time; it has to be one or the other. It said that because it has run the numbers and knows probably better than we do what Trident will cost, given the control that it will continue to exert over it. I ask the Conservatives—this may be a forlorn hope—to think about the consequences of spending that amount of the defence budget on nuclear weapons.

We call on the UK Government to explore and debate the opportunities that a change in its nuclear weapons stance could provide to other areas of defence and public spending, and for taking forward its commitment to nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament.

I look forward to the debate.

I move,

That the Parliament notes with concern new analysis by the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, which suggests a dramatic increase in the projected cost of the successor Trident nuclear weapons programme to £167 billion; believes that it is indefensible for the UK Government to commit billions of pounds of public money to nuclear weapons, particularly when individuals and families across Scotland and the UK are suffering from the consequences of austerity cuts, and calls on the UK Government to cancel plans for the renewal of Trident.