Speeches by Martin.

“Dr Hill, General Barrons has said that the Munich security conference happened and then the penny dropped and there was a realisation that there was a change in American posture in Europe, and America was less engaged in European security. There are few people in the world with the level of expertise that you have abou…”

“So if the carriers are in the Indian ocean, then that review has failed?”

“You seem to be saying that it was obvious to you from November, rather than what General Barrons said, which was that there was a realisation later on about that.”

“It is a pinch-point trade.”

“If I may, why will this time be different?”

“If we look at the UK military and compare it to other militaries, we have a very high ratio of admirals, air marshals, and generals as compared to the number of personnel across our militaries. We are talking about reform and radical thinking, so it seems there is an argument for reducing the number of starred officers…”

“It is integrated. We are going in that direction, are we not?”

“It is not just a cost issue, because the salary of an admiral or an air marshal is nothing as compared to an F-35. There is that idea that, when you have a very busy field at the top of an organisation and they all have staff and departments, that actually slows down the ability of that organisation to make fast decisi…”

“Just dealing with this personnel issue, obviously all three services were shrinking in size. As I understand it, the Navy and the RAF have just started—”

“They are net positive, but still below the trend line that you would like to fulfil the whole. The Army is still shrinking in size. Could you just comment on some of the challenges that still remain? The Army has been shrinking in size for some time now.”

“Are those things changing?”

“Thank you, Admiral, for your time. The current Government are instituting a period of defence reform. This is a significant rewiring of the Ministry of Defence. As a brief introduction, could you just take us through the problems with the old structure and how this new structure is going to solve those problems?”

“Why?”

“It sounds great, and like many good ideas it also sounds obvious. The idea of having the Chief of the Defence Staff commanding the other chiefs is obvious. The idea of having a national armaments director is obvious. Why was it not done before?”

“I want to clarify some of the Minister’s earlier remarks in response to questions from my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George) and in his previous answer. The Minister said earlier that the trade in goods from settlements attracts a higher tariff. Will he therefore confirm that the British Government, by …”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“If we put aside the internecine warfare of the Labour party, the hon. Gentleman is making an interesting point about a retreat from the world. Retreating from the world as the west, the UK or the US, opens the door to creating more problems, and then we retreat further. Would he argue that that is what we are doing—vac…”

“On geopolitics, will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“I think we can all agree that we would like a decision to be made in this case that does not encourage the Chinese Government to think that we are a soft touch. Let us try another tack. National security is going to be taken into account as part of this planning decision. I ask the Minister this hypothetical question: …”

“I completely agree that not enough social homes are being built. Does the hon. Lady think we should have a target for social homes in the Bill?”