Extracts from Parliamentary proceedings - Jan 12
Friday, 13 January 2017 07:52
Extracts from Lords debate on Armed Forces: Capability Lord Craig
of Radley (CB):...The Army and the Royal Navy have faced similar
reductions in the past 30 years in their musclepower. What, then,
should the Armed Forces be expected to do? Rule out unforeseen
operations of the scale or intensity fielded in 1982 to recover the
Falklands, or in 1991 to throw the Iraqis out of Kuwait? Indeed,
enduring operations on the scale of those in Iraq and Afghanistan
are no longer feasible without strong...Request free trial
Extracts from Lords
debate on Armed Forces: Capability
Lord (CB):...The
Army and the Royal Navy have faced similar reductions in the past
30 years in their musclepower. What, then, should the Armed Forces
be expected to do? Rule out unforeseen operations of the scale or
intensity fielded in 1982 to recover the Falklands, or in 1991 to
throw the Iraqis out of Kuwait? Indeed, enduring operations on the
scale of those in Iraq and Afghanistan are no longer feasible
without strong Allied involvement. Even the more limited scale of
offensive operations now in hand, mainly by the RAF, is stretching
the human side of this activity...
(Lab):...The RAF is already is already operating
flat out on its existing missions. The air police work in the
Baltics, in Syria and in Iraq, and provide quick-reaction aircraft
in the Falklands. Those are all fairly modest
operations, and I do not see any spare capacity there at all.
Although I strongly welcome General Carter’s new focus on deploying
the Army at divisional strength with new strike brigades, no
provision at all seems to be made in SDSR 2015 regarding where the
air defence role is going to come from. Our Rapier forces are fully
committed to defending the Falklands. Pulling them out of there would
send a very unfortunate signal...
To read the whole debate, CLICK
HERE
Extract from Westminster
Hall debate on UK Maritime Industry
(Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab):...If he is
still Shipping Minister in September—I certainly hope he will be—it
will be great to welcome the Minister to attend the Merchant Navy
Day memorial service on 3 September at Tower Hill; I am not an
organiser but it is taking place in my constituency. The national
memorial commemorates the tens of thousands of merchant mariners
who died in the first and second world wars and
the Falklands war. For their families,
there are no graves to visit; that is their loved one’s resting
place...
(North West Durham)
(Lab):...We are an island nation, a net importer, and we
are now leaving the European Union. We have the largest port sector
in Europe in terms of tonnage handled and, as has been said, we
have millions of ferry passengers every year. Our economic, social
and security interests will depend more than at any time since the
second world war on seafarers and a resilient UK maritime skills
base. It is probably worth putting this in context. At the time of
the Falklands war in 1982, the UK had a
strong merchant naval sector; we employed 58,000 UK seafarers. That
figure has now shrunk by almost 60% to 23,000. That is the context
in which we are working...
To read the whole debate, CLICK
HERE
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