Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2017-03-13
Topic: Other
Questions: Can my right hon. Friend recall a time when the deployment of British forces to a NATO ally has not had the support of the whole House?; The Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment headquarters and museum, Fulwood barracks, is to be sold off, while its 2nd battalion will lose over half its complement of soldiers and move to Aldershot. That will leave just one regular infantry battalion in the north-west by 2020 in that regiment, which as it stands has no headquarters identified after 2022. What message do the Government think that sends to serving personnel in St Helens and to the young men and women who want to follow in their footsteps and join Merseyside’s county regiment?; Thirty-five years on, our armed forces still play a vital role in safeguarding the security of the Falkland Islands and other British overseas territories in the south Atlantic. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that this Government are committed to maintaining a strong armed forces presence in the Falklands?; Toolmakers in my constituency such as J. Adams Ltd have made high-quality military knives for the defence sector for six generations. The UK’s manufacturing industry is more than capable of supplying the sector, but new Royal Navy Trident submarines and offshore patrol vessels are being built using foreign steel. When is the Ministry of Defence going to publish a proper defence industrial strategy so that we can start supporting UK steel and manufacturing instead of buying off the shelf from abroad?; Last week the Royal United Services Institute published a report demonstrating that the Royal Navy is no longer designed for sea control in the north Atlantic. Indeed, there is not one major surface vessel based in Scotland. Can the Minister confirm that the lesser spotted national shipbuilding strategy, if and when we eventually see it, will redress this strategic imbalance?; The latest UK armed forces monthly figures show that while 6,690 people joined the reservists in the past 12 months, over 5,000 left. What more is being done to encourage the retention of reservists?; Following on from the answer that the Minister gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss), can she name the projects in which British steel is actually being used to safeguard British steelworkers jobs?; We continue to hear stories of our service personnel being forced to live without heating and sometimes without being able to take a shower for days, as detailed in recent reports about the Wellington and Baker barracks. Do the Government really think it is acceptable to leave our brave servicemen and women in such squalid conditions?
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. We must move on. Before I take points of order, I am pleased to inform the House that we are being visited today by the Catholic Archbishop of Yangon in Burma, a country with which, as colleagues will know, we have a programme of parliamentary capacity building. It is a delight to see Cardinal Charles Bo viewing our proceedings today. It is the second time he has come in recent months—he clearly cannot get enough of us—and I am sure colleagues will want to impress the great man with the decency of their behaviour.