Speeches by Healey.

“The Strategic Defence Review was always a strategic review. It was not there to make the detailed investment decisions; that is my job, our job. That is the job we are now doing to implement the Strategic Defence Review through the defence investment planning process. What it did was recognise that there were prioritie…”

“When you look at the £270 billion we will be spending in this Parliament, the fact we will hit 3% in the next Parliament and we have made a commitment like the other 31 allies as members of NATO to 3.5% on Defence by 2035, this gives us that certain decade of rising defence spending, which I talked about to Ms Scrogham…”

“They are not all going to happen in the first year; they cannot. The SDR was a vision and essentially an outline strategic plan for the next decade, and that is what we will pursue.”

“First, it is a Parliament-long programme. I could tell you what progress looks like after 18 months. A Chief of the Defence Staff who now commands the service chiefs for the first time. A newly defined, powerful and appointed National Armaments Director for the first time in this country. A new Military Strategic Headq…”

“You have lost me. The SDR was a reset of this country’s strategic defence and security approach. It was done so to reflect the framework of priorities that we had set out in our manifesto.”

“They will be part of what we look to pursue over the next decade because we want to implement those parts of the SDR.”

“I may be being a bit slow but I am still not following you. Of course the Strategic Defence Review was a review and a resetting of Britain’s strategic priorities. We left behind—we said at the election we would—the bombast of a global Britain under Boris Johnson. We were recognising the increasing threats, that America…”

“Yes.”

“I am still failing to understand your question. Chair, perhaps if you need to, you can write to me on this.”

“I understand those concerns that businesses sometimes voice. I would just say that this is in the context of a greater certainty that this sector has not had. There is no one working in the defence industry today who knew they would be working in the certain decade of rising defence spending ahead. No one working withi…”

“I am going to ask General Nesmith to talk about that. So no to savings. We are making decisions about controlling and managing our budgets within the year, as you would expect us to. And no to prioritising shiny big platforms over the operations and concerns to put the men and women in uniform at the heart of our defen…”

“They will be part of what we plan to deliver over the next decade, which is, of course, the period of the SDR.”

“Are you talking about the equipment plan produced under the last Government? Why on earth would we continue with something that was as badly flawed as that? It was not just that the NAO regarded it as underfunded and unlikely to be delivered; it also pointed out that the whole way that defence was previously putting th…”

“I am sorry, Mr Bailey, I am just not following what you are saying.”

“You have been positive about the way that we have been able to do that to this Committee and there were complaints that the previous Committee did not get that information. If it is a briefing that the Committee is looking for on the way that we are trying to change what the permanent secretary describes as a strategic…”

“Of course. You are a one-man institutional memory for this Committee if I may say so, Mr Norman.”

“The short answer to your question is no and no. The budget this year is £6 billion bigger than it was last year so we are spending more. Of course, as you would expect—as the public would expect—we are trying to make sure that we spend that well, that it reflects the priorities and rising pressures on Defence at the mo…”

“Reform never ends. What I will do is bring General Nesmith and the permanent secretary in in a moment because they can talk about how what we do now and how we do it is different to 18 months ago, particularly General Nesmith. For me, the purpose of this is that we have a defence system that is better able and quicker …”

“We have an annual cycle of reporting the work of the Department in full, and the SDR is not a subset of that. The SDR is essentially the framework and vision within which Defence will now make its decisions, set its priorities and deliver the programmes and the aims that it has set out. So it fundamentally sets the dir…”

“I have not had a specific formal briefing on those, Ms Baker, but those have been part of some of the discussions I have had when I have been in NATO headquarters and we have been meeting as defence Ministers, particularly on the margins of some of those meetings.”