HC Deb 31 July 1964 vol 699 cc1974-97

12.47 p.m.

Commander Anthony Courtney (Harrow, East)

I am very grateful for the opportunity today of raising a question which has concerned a few of us who are interested in these things for a long time, namely, the failure of this country hitherto to have developed a viable type of joint service aircraft. In reply to a recent Question in which I asked whether my right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence had under construction or development for the Royal Air Force any military aircraft one condition of which must be the possibility of operating from aircraft carriers. I received the reply that, if my right hon. Friend knew of such an aircraft, he would certainly get on with it and develop it.

I shall endeavour to show that that possibility exists and that there are grounds for believing that it could be something of a world-beater in military aircraft tailored to a new set of tactical requirements. I believe that in the development of an aircraft suitable for joint Service use the number of requirements has narrowed for us over a period of years. It is a sad reflection that after a period of half a century in which man flew in his own projectile—if one can talk about the history of weapons in those terms—such a magnificent tradition as has been built up by the manned fighter defence of Great Britain is no longer a practicable or feasible proposition. I contend that it will be found—and accepted as defence policy in this country in the very near future—that the era of the manned fighter is coming to an end, and that the only defence of this country, as the home base for all for which we stand, will be found to be in a deterrent force, always ready to conduct a second strike retaliatory attack.

In narrowing the requirements, we can cut out the fighter requirement for the United Kingdom pure and simple—the Lightning R.A.F. Mach 2 aircraft, is a magnificent weapon in present circumstances. We have to think of a combined Service requirement that no longer lays emphasis on land-borne fighters operating from long runways, but on ground attack in support of amphibious operations, on low-level penetration, which is now very fashionable, under the radar, terrain-hugging techniques which have a great tactical future, particularly for this country, and on fighter support, not of a home base any longer, but of something equally important, if only this country and this House were to wake up to the real underlying necessities of our strategic situation, namely, the fighter support of amphibious power, as developed throughout the world. I include the fighter defence of the fleet which supports that amphibious power, and fighters operating for the protection of convoys, in which our merchant shipping will inevitably have to proceed in the event of future hostilities, in a manner which has for perhaps four centuries been found necessary.

We must face a situation in which we require to develop tactical air power at widely separated points throughout the world in a changing set of diplomatic and political circumstances, as well as strategic and geograhpical circumstances, to which, in my contention, we have not paid sufficient attention. I cannot help feeling that for years my hon. Friend and his Department, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence, have been fairly consistent recipients of faulty technical advice in these great questions, hinged as they are on an aircraft industry and on all the backing of instrumentation and weapons development which is required for military aircraft in general.

I believe that this has been due mainly to a concentration on the air per se—the air, as if it were an element on its own, unattached either to the land or the sea. It is particularly in the latter respect, as we remain an island and a maritime power, that I believe that we have gone severely wrong. The aircraft of the present and of the future—the joint military aircraft which I am trying to describe today—must be related ab initio to the airfield characteristics from which they have to operate. This is where, in my submission, the P1154 project—a magnificent concept—has gone very wrong. There has been a basic failure to appreciate the defence implications and, equally, the fact that we are no longer an imperial Power commanding control over great areas of the world's land surface and the use of land airfieds in friendly and allied countries.

We hear of daily threats to our staging points and to our bases. We cling to the feeling that perhaps Singapore and Aden are solid, static and unshakeable—although even that feeling is called into question from time to time for purely political reasons. We know of the doubts about Libyan air bases and of our feelings towards Malta, changing rapidly defencewise in the light of its present constitution and independence. We know of the possibility of our overflying rights in the case of such a firm and staunch ally as Turkey shortly being curtailed if the Cyprus question is not solved at least with some respect for Turkish national aspirations.

The belated realisation of these facts of life—the lateness of this realisation—has led us into a sorry mess in the production of military aircraft, for, regardless of this factor, we have gone all out for vertical take-off and short take-off characteristics, as if we were sure of those widely flung points from which our aircraft can operate from short runways, utilising these technical characteristics. But the aircraft have to get there. For many years this point has escaped the technical advisers of my hon. Friend and his Department and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence.

There has been a yearning after the retention, somehow, of staging posts and bases from which our land-based aircraft will operate. This has been reflected in the emphasis on ferry characteristics in new types of aircraft. It is said, "We need another 1,000 miles ferrying range, because So-and-So is about to be declared independent, or gobbled up by some modern form of dictatorship." The further emphasis on flight refuelling is all in line with this nostalgic effort to force the present to conform to the strategic conditions of the past.

Here again, we have fallen into grave technical error. In fact, it has been a little worse than that, because there has been a tendency for technical advice to ignore two basic strategic factors which exist—and the existence of which any thinking man in this House or the country will realise, as soon as he thinks about the matter at all. The first is that where we have unreliable or nonexistent land bases overseas it is quite practicable to design perfect floating airfields from which our aircraft can operate. One is accused of Service partisanship at once if one refers to these as aircraft carriers. One is accused of banging the drum and of producing a vast, vulnerable citadel paddling about the ocean and needing great protection itself if it is to operate at all. It would be a repository of immense expenditure financially, and of expenditure in highly-skilled manpower.

Of course, those arguments are valid as far as they go. But what is the alternative? It is that the TSR 2, if present political strategic conditions persist, and the P 1154, if it ever comes into service, will operate, certainly from the U.K., perhaps from Aden, perhaps from Singapore—but I am hanged if I can see them operating from anywhere else.

There seems to be a pathological disinclination on the part of the technical advisers in these great Ministries to consider the floating airfield, the aircraft carrier, as a suitable substitute for land bases, and I contend that that disinclination, and that alone, has been responsible for the terrible to-ing and fro-ing, the appalling arguments and the time-wasting that have gone on in the discussion whether or not we should lay down a new generation of aircraft carriers, the first of which has now been accepted by Her Majesty's Government.

It is pointed out that such carriers are terribly vulnerable. We all agree. But we should point out that they in turn require air defence on the support group which contains the carrier and that is especially important now that the fixed wing aircraft in Her Majesty's aircraft carriers represents what is, in effect, the main armament of the Fleet for surface action—as I have said before this House—in the absence of the development by this country of a surface-to-surface guided missile comparable to that which has been developed most efficiently by the Soviet Union—

Mr. Frederick Mulley (Sheffield, Park)

Before the hon. and gallant Member leaves the subject of the aircraft carrier, will he deal with the likely cost of his proposals? Will he also say something on what to me has always been the most impressive argument against the big aircraft carrier, which is not only its vulnerability but the fact that it is very likely to be in the wrong part of the world when it is required?

Commander Courtney

I am afraid that the cost will be very high because, without numbers, one cannot possibly meet that particular difficulty. As to the other part of the hon. Gentleman's question, one knows that these carriers are vulnerable, but I am not so concerned with that today. I am perhaps straying slightly from the rules of order in talking about carriers at all, but they are germane to my subject, which is the development of a new type of aircraft incorporating a British principle which will go a very long way towards solving both those problems, and I hope that I shall be able to show why.

If we are to think in terms of floating airfields—aircraft carriers—the principle of vertical take-off is an expensive absurdity. Why? Because in the carrier we have a built-in, short-take-off capacity—in our catapults, in our angled decks and in our arrestor wires. We can provide on board our floating airfield all that expensive and extremely weighty and complex equipment that must be provided for an aircraft that has to do the same thing from a short airfield ashore. It is surely obvious to anyone who thinks of these things that if we are to operate the P1154 with S.T.O.L. characteristics from an aircraft carrier, because it has too great a technical requirement for its actual land take-off characteristics it must suffer in performance when air-borne, and I am sure that that lesson will be learned shortly, and most expensively, by the Ministry.

Going further back in our examination of policy over many years, it is no coincidence that in the last war the Royal Navy was deplorably equipped with military aircraft. That is common ground throughout the House. That was the reason for the expensive purchase then of American naval aircraft which were adapted to operate from British aircraft carriers. I submit that those same errors of thinking have brought about a situation in which we, in requiring, as we urgently do, a replacement for the Sea Vixen all-weather fighter of the Royal Navy, are forced—and rightly, in the circumstances—to buy the Phantom aircraft from America.

I turn now to the ideal aircraft—and one always strives for the ideal—which I believe would fulfil a joint Service rôle in the new circumstances that I have outlined, assuming, of course, that they are accepted strategically and technically on both sides of the House. From my study of the matter, I am convinced that the answer lies—and it is a complex and a difficult, but perhaps not too expensive an answer—in the application of a British technical principle that was first brought out in this House, I think, by my hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Ely (Sir H. Legge-Bourke), whose speeches on the subject six years ago I have read with the greatest interest.

It is a development associated with the names of Dr. Barnes Wallis and Vickers-Armstrong (Aircraft) as the firm was in those days—it is now, of course, the British Aircraft Corporation. It is a development which, theoretically at least, gives to the military mind the promise of a flexibility of operation in an individual type of aircraft that has never yet existed in the history of military aeronautics.

It provides, as you doubtless know, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, for the folding of the wings of the aircraft in variable geometry, a variable configuration, a variable aspect ratio of the wing, adjusted to fit in with operational circumstances of the moment. On widely-spread wings, it will give a low stalling speed, reasonable landing characteristic and safety in the hands of learner pilots. On wings spread out at high altitudes it gives the equivalent, as we would say in the Navy, of a cruiser turbine—an economical means of extending the endurance of an aircraft while on patrol over the sea—a wonderful attribute for the Shackleton as the main Coastal Command aircraft of the moment—and, essential for proper performance for fighter protection of the Fleet. But at the approach of an enemy, at the approach of a threat to that aircraft patrolling over the Fleet with its wings spread, it can draw those wings back and go into its fighting attitude, giving it a mach 2 or 2.5 performance, enabling it to out-distance, out-fight and out-manoeuvre"' any comparable fixed wing aircraft in development at the present time—

Mr. Mulley

I am rather puzzled to know whether the hon. and gallant Gentleman proposes that we should being a completely new aircraft development, or whether he is merely arguing that what we need is the American TFX. I should like to know his opinion as to how far, if successful the TFX would meet the requirements he outlines.

Commander Courtney

The hon. Gentleman would do me a kindness, and would perhaps do the House a kindness, if he were to wait for me to develop my argument. The TFX is an American version of a British development, and will figure in my remarks. The hon. Gentleman may perhaps surmise what I am leading up to.

I was talking of fighter efficiency by means of the folding of a wing at great height, which gives an aircraft completely different characteristics.

There is, of course, the other response which one can get in its ground attack, hedge hopping rôle, where again the wings are folded back to give it good gust response and a very high supersonic speed. All these can be obtained by utilising the principle of the hinged wing, or the swing-wing, as it is sometimes called, in one type of aircraft. This type has been on the drawing board for many years. It has had perhaps £3 million, a great deal of it Government money, spent on its development. I believe, as I hope I shall show, that it is time that we capitalised on that expenditure and seized an opportunity which I submit exists.

I hope that in considering this joint type of aircraft we have come back to the necessity to observe airfield characteristics and, in the light of the strategic and political situation in which we find ourselves in the world, to realise that any joint military aircraft of the future must per se, right from the start, be capable of operating from our own aircraft carriers. Here, if we wished, we could gain a considerable advantage because, as it is known, there may be some penalty on the operation of Phantom aircraft in the smallest of our three aircraft carriers which will form the fleet of the 1970s, namely the "Hermes". Not only could we discount that disadvantage by the use of the swing-wing variable geometry aircraft, but we could extend the use and operation of the aircraft well below the deck characteristics which we rely on for fixed-wing aircraft to include the Centaur and Albion classes of commando carrier for the swing-wing machine.

I am sure the House would agree that this would be the most economic use of this new type of lighter aircraft with folding wings. I would go as far as to say that in time of emergency this type of aircraft, with its low landing speed and carrier operational characteristics, would be admirably suited if it existed in reasonably large numbers to the swift conversion of merchant ships' hulls into floating platforms for the landing and maintenance of aircraft, adapted to take the arrestor gear and perhaps catapults but not necessarily either of these in emergency when sudden expansion is required, because our only three carriers may be in one part of the world and we are going to need more at the other end.

We should visualise for the Royal Navy these joint military aircraft as a third naval aircraft supplement to the existing Buccaneer, which has a specific rôle to play, and to the Phantom which will succeed the Sea Vixen shortly as an all-weather naval fighter. There might conceivably be an alteration of the Phantom financial requirement if the development of a light type of swing-wing aircraft was to prove as successful as many of us hope.

There is a second very important application for a type of variable geometry aircraft such as I have described. It is that of the advanced trainer which is becoming necessary for all nations that intend to go ahead with supersonic military aircraft. I believe that there is already an embryo requirement in the F.A.F. for an advanced trainer, when the Jet Provost goes, to take over the existing Gnat-Hunter trainer sequence for the training of combat-stream operational pilots, paralleled by a naval requirement which is growing in numbers and importance.

An advanced trainer of this kind would have the inestimable advantage that at some point of the training one would have ab initio the wings spread to give low-flying characteristics and low landing speed. It would have its wings pegged until such time as the pilot could take them out and in the same aircraft go off and do exercises in his fighter rôle with the geometry varying to bring the wings back.

Does such an ideal exist? I come now to the point made by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley). Of course it does, and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Aviation will not say to me that the Americans, who developed a British idea in producing the TFX variable geometry aircraft, are entirely on the wrong track. I cannot believe that my hon. Friend will tell me that the Americans, having had the benefit of all our experience by virtue of the mutual aid contract of some years ago, are entirely barking up the wrong tree. Rumour has it that they are having difficulties, and I am sure that my hon. Friend will mention this. Sadly, it is always the first reaction of Ministers in these very important matters to bring all these difficulties and potential difficulties into what I think is rather too great perspective. I hope that my hon. Friend will not do that today.

We have it that the TFX is 18 months behind schedule. This may be true, but the Americans are going ahead with it. This great nation, the United States, a continent with far less maritime worldwide commitments than we have, make it a prerequisite of the first variable geometry military aircraft that it should be able to fly from an American aircraft carrier. Here we have an opportunity which the Americans, bless them, may have given us, because the scale of attack of an American project of this kind is grandiose. They go into it up to the neck, and, by jove, they have done just that with the TFX. They have produced aircraft with astonishing drawing board characteristics, and with an all-up weight which we would not dream of producing, because they are going to use them on gigantic floating platforms. Even as an ex-naval officer I hope that we shall not go in for the Forrestal and Enterprise classes of aircraft carrier which alone can contain aircraft of the all-up weight of a TFX.

At last we have a great opportunity. If the Minister and his right hon. Friends change some of their thinking and we re-orientate some of our fundamental ideas, we have the opportunity of producing a small equivalent of the TFX, a swing-wing "Mini" of the future with our military aircraft tailored to fit the existing aircraft carrier fleet and of a size which will suit our needs in the future.

There is one very important point here. Dominion navies, certain allied navies, and perhaps others, have aircraft carriers which will require a military aircraft with a supersonic performance such as is given by this swing-wing "Mini" that I have been describing. I can imagine a very valuable export market in the purely military field for such an aircraft, observing that the American TFX cannot possibly be utilised from the carriers of any of those nations; and it may even be that the Australians, having made their choice of a variable geometry aircraft as opposed to the fixed-wing TSR2, will come round to that feeling in readjusting their ideas and adopting a new British initiative for their smaller carriers. I believe that this is feasible.

We have a flexibility and an adaptability in this British principle of variable geometry which we shall ignore at our peril, while wasting the £3 million that we have already spent on developments, unless we do something about it pretty soon. The export potential not only as a military fighting aircraft but as an advanced trainer, as I mentioned previously, for every country which desires to develop supersonic aircraft is incalculable—a rôle for this aircraft which I suggest must be looked at as secondary to the main one. We are so inclined to get our priorities wrong. We are so inclined to think that because this would be good as a trainer, we should design it with an eye to the training characteristics, rather than go all out for the best military aircraft which we can develop.

I suggest that the French, looking as they are at the moment for a cheaper supplement to the Mirage III series, which of course are vastly expensive, and searching for a subsonic low-level fighter aircraft, might think again and turn to the British swing-wing aircraft which could offer an incomparably better performance. The possibilities are considerable. I am sure that this can be done. We cannot afford to waste time. These things go ahead. Who knows—the Americans themselves might realise the error of the grandiosity of their venture and turn to something rather smaller than the TFX.

I suggest that in what is primarily a defence matter it would have been courteous to have a defence Minister with my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary on the Front Bench today-

Mr. Mulley

Hear, hear.

Commander Courtney

I would ask him to go into this matter closely and at once, and see whether we, having made so many mistakes in the air industry, in our air corporations, should not be thoroughly dissatisfied with ourselves, despite the immense technological progress which we have made and the immense skills which we have. I believe that the military swing-wing "Mini" would be a means whereby we could return to the forefront in the field of military aircraft.

1.35 p.m.

Mr. Frederick Mulley (Sheffield, Park)

I think it is appropriate, in the calm of today before the storms which are to come, that we should have a debate on the provision of aircraft which has been a frequent subject in our debates during this very long Parliament, now coming to an end.

Despite the charming and persuasive manner of the hon. and gallant Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney), I should like to congratulate him on one of the gravest indictments of Government policy that I have ever had the privilege of hearing during the last five years. He said—and I agree with him completely—that the whole of the procurement of military aircraft is in a sorry mess.

I would, however, disagree with the hon. and gallant Gentleman on one point, where he rather passionately attacked the technical advisers of the Ministers. Unfortunately, it is an all-too-common tendency in the House these days to attack civil servants and military advisers who cannot reply to debates. I am sure that, on reflection, the hon. and gallant Gentleman will recognise and accept that his criticism must be taken by the Ministers who are and have been responsible for the state of affairs to which he was referring.

Commander Courtney

I am sorry. Perhaps I was a little carried away. I should have said "technical advice" and not "technical advisers". Just as we attack each other's policies, we do not attack each other. That is what I intended to convey. I have the greatest appreciation, as I know has the hon. Gentleman, for the ability and integrity of the gentlemen concerned.

Mr. Mulley

I am grateful to the hon. and gallant Gentleman. I am sure that he was carried away by his very strong feelings on this subject and that he would not have wished his remarks to be construed, as they might have been, as an attack on the advisers of the Crown.

I think that the hon. and gallant Gentleman's strategic views can best be summed up—perhaps a little unkindly, but he will understand that time is not with us today—if I say that he believes that the Royal Navy has to do most of the defence jobs for the country in the future. As he was developing his point I was wondering where the other two Services are likely to come in. This is a vital point to settle, because I believe that half the troubles that the hon. and gallant Gentleman was describing arise from the fact that we have not had a clear and settled defence policy over the past years and that we have not got one now. It is because the rôles and the tasks of our forces have not been clearly laid down that we have this coming and going about decisions on aircraft carriers one day, bomber aircraft the next, and so on, and so forth.

The other factor which is of vital importance, with which I realise the hon. and gallant Gentleman, as a back bench Member, was not able to deal adequately, is the cost. All these questions have got to be related within, first, the matter of policy and, second, the matter of what the Americans call the cost effectiveness of carrying out that policy. If, within such a policy, a case can be made for a variable geometry aircraft it should be given extremely careful consideration.

Since we have the Minister here, and since a very large defence bill of £2,000 million was presented earlier this year, I should like him to confirm that none of the aircraft that was discussed at great length at that time were included in the bill for the estimates for this year—the Phantom, the TSR2, the Shackleton replacement, the VC 10, the Argosy and the other transport aircraft—and that only a very small amount of the aircraft provision that the Services required is actually in the estimates for this year. In going through the estimates for next year, as I am sure the Departments are now doing, if they are to meet the amount of aircraft requirement that the hon. and gallant Gentleman said, the defence estimate must be getting nearer £3,000 million than £2,000 million. It is this kind of sum that we should seriously bear in mind. As the hon. and gallant Gentleman said, it is not a cheap exercise to provide an aircraft carrier with the flotilla to support it and the aircraft. I agree that if we are to have aircraft carriers, they must have the best aircraft that can be provided. This is not an inexpensive exercise.

The question of delay, too, is serious. If the hon. and gallant Gentleman's argument is accepted—I do not entirely accept it myself—that we need, as he put it, a variable geometry "Mini", how long will it take to provide it? As he rightly says, we have not thought out our requirements. We have to go to the United States now for a successor to the Sea Vixen and we have not anything ourselves. We have played around and we have not got a good Service aircraft. The operational requirement for the Shackleton replacement has not yet been published, and we shall probably have to go to France, to America or somewhere else for it. It is a very sorry situation, and, because of the neglect over the years, I am not sure that we can wait to develop this kind of plane from scratch.

Commander Courtney

I think that I am right in saying that the original design for the Sea Vixen replacement was variable geometry. It was turned down on grounds of cost and because of the effort put into the P1154 as the joint Service aircraft. I think that this is so, and I believe that, now delay has been caused and the gap has been bridged by the Phantom, it might well be felt that the present was the right time for working out the new "Mini" which I have described.

Mr. Mulley

I am rather frightened by the cost of all these exercises. If we make mistakes and have to buy aircraft costing £2 million or £3 million apiece to fill the gaps, what will happen to the TSR 2? As I understand, it is to be the Royal Air Force aircraft for the 1970s. Presumably, if we accept the hon. and gallant Gentlemen's view, the TSR2 ought to be scrapped. I do not know what the state of play is. We hear from week to week that it is about to fly. I wonder whether it is being retained to fly in Preston during election week so as to stimulate the Conservative Party's prospects there. As far as I know, it has not yet flown. Perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary will tell us.

What about the amount of money spent? One understands that research and development on the TSR2 has been very great indeed. I believe that only 20 prototype experimental planes have been ordered. Clearly, we shall want more than that. What sort of order do the Government envisage for the TSR2, and what total cost can we expect? It is extremely difficult to take decisions on these matters without some idea of the financial implications.

So far, the Minister of Aviation has spent his time saying that other people's estimates of cost are wildly wrong, or that it will not exceed X per cent. of somebody else's estimate. It is time that the House, even on this last day, was given some hard facts and figures about what the Government have done so far in the provision of the TSR2.

Commander Courtney

With respect, may I correct an impression which the hon. Gentleman gave? The TSR2 is a fixed-wing aircraft, far too heavy for aircraft carriers and, therefore, it has no possible joint Service use.

Mr. Mulley

I hope that the hon. and gallant Gentleman did not think that I was so illiterate as not to know that the TSR2 was a fixed-wing aircraft or that it was not envisaged as having a joint Service potential. I was merely pointing out the unpleasant fact that his Government have spent a great deal of money on research and development of this aircraft and, unless it is to be required in sufficient numbers and to fulfil a useful military rôle, about £500 million will probably have gone down the drain.

If the Royal Air Force is to have its Canberra replacement in the form of the TSR, as I understand it is, this clearly reduces the potential demand in the short run for the kind of joint Service requirement that the hon. and gallant Gentleman has in mind. It is most significant that the military operational requirement issued by the Air Ministry for the TSR2 was identical—I think that the Americans came along and picked it up—with the actual military operational requirement set for the TFX, so, in terms of military requirement, these aircraft are meant to do the same job.

Obviously, if expense is no object, the idea of having the greater flexibility provided by variable geometry becomes very attractive, but I think that the main reason why the Americans have gone in for this is that they envisage, probably, a long flight from the United States and then the aircraft having to change and go straight into action. I am not at all sure that our circumstances will be parallel. If we are to have aircraft carriers in order to provide a base for aircraft to go on continental-size missions, this, with respect, would appear to be an extremely expensive way of providing a base for aircraft.

Therefore, while the idea is extremely attractive and I regret very much that this British idea has not been developed here in Britain, I cannot altogether accept what the hon. and gallant Gentleman urges upon is. Incidentally, this is another instance of Britain producing the idea. As a country, we spend more on research and development per capita than any other country, perhaps even including the United States, but, somehow or other, it all gets lost and never comes into production. This is true over the whole range of British industry. It is a great indictment of the way our affairs have been conducted, particularly bearing in mind that about two-thirds of all our research moneys are provided by the Government.

This is another occasion when we have, perhaps, missed the boat. I wonder whether the Royal Air Force or the Navy can wait seven or more years. I have rather lost track of time since the TSR2 was first mentioned in our debates. It must have been at least six or seven years ago. It was then spoken of as a Canberra replacement. Then the magic letters "TSR" were attached to it. Then, for a brief moment, it was an answer to the deterrent gap, it would have a strategic bonus, so it was said, although we all know that it was not a strategic plane at all. All this has happened, and the aircraft has not yet flown.

I repeat what my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said about the TSR2, when he spoke in Preston on 19th June. He said that the Minister is always spreading rumours that Labour will cancel it. I repudiate those rumours. Our position on the TSR2 is exactly the same as the Government's. If it works and does what is expected of it, and at reasonable cost, we shall want it—though not for a nuclear rôle—we shall want it for its original tactical and reconnaissance rôle. The nuclear rôle was a political afterthought. For all we know of it, it is a triumph of British aircraft electronics design, revolutionary and highly sophisticated in its conception. It has yet to prove itself. As one looks at the aircraft industry as a whole and the orders for aircraft which the Government have placed, one finds that none of these aircraft has proved itself. This House and those outside who wish to take an intelligent interest in defence and aircraft policy have been denied the facts on which to form a real judgment. I hope that a Labour Government will look very carefully into the hon. and gallant Gentleman's arguments, though he will understand that it would be quite impossible for me to embrace them today.

1.38 p.m.

Sir Harry Legge-Bourke (Isle of Ely)

I think that there are about six minutes left for me to speak. I begin by congratulating my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) on having raised this topic. As he so kindly reminded the House, I started to take an interest in these matters way back in 1957. At that time, I had the good fortune to meet Dr. Barnes Wallis who was then trying to prevent the financial taps being turned off on his development of the Swallow aircraft. I think it true to say that, if he were given the opportunity today to renew what he was then trying to do, the sort of aircraft he would design would look very different from the design he then had for the Swallow.

This is always the case in any design. As further experience is gained, great changes take place. But we should remember that if the United States becomes the first country to have a practical variable sweep-back aircraft it will owe Dr. Barnes Wallis an enormous amount, because when the financial taps were turned off he went over to Langley Field in the United States and virtually told them all that he had learned from his research into this matter.

I certainly agree with my hon. and gallant Friend that if there is a particularly suitable type of aircraft which can be used in all three Services, we should seriously consider it. I think that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary would agree that ever since the Defence White Paper which was introduced by Lord Watkinson when he was Minister of Defence, we have been conceiving the defence of our long lines of communication of keeping the peace in various parts of the world on what I call a triadic basis with the three Services working together. If we can find an aircraft which meets the needs of all three Services to fit in with that grand strategic plan, we should be well advised to pursue it with the utmost vigour.

Variable sweep-back conjures up all sorts of ideas in people's minds, but it is important that we should make a clear distinction in the difference between the sort of aircraft which we are talking about—the TFX and others—and variable sweep-back aircraft. It has not been put better than it was put by Oliver Stewart in the Spectator on 27th April, 1962. He started an article called "Polymorphs for Passengers" as follows: Those who want to fly at 2,000 or 3,000 miles an hour will eventually be asked to choose between two different kinds of air vessel: the efflux box and the polymorph. The signs are that, for carrying passengers over great distances at great heights and speeds, polymorphs—that is, variable geometry aircraft with wings which can be swept back at different angles to give the shape best suited to any required speed—are to the choice of the future … For military applications, the efflux box, consisting of a cabin or cockpit which lifts itself on jets having fixed or vectored thrust lines and then sits on them, may be preferred. It uses vestigial wings for cruising and top-speed flights, but it is primarily a large lump of undiluted horsepower unlikely to be well received by passengers. I have always felt that it is very important that we should realise that a vertical take-off aircraft from the time that it is static to the point when it becomes fully airborne and manoeuvrable in the air is working at the maximum aerodynamic disadvantage, and the colossal weight of engine involved in getting that horizontal plane up vertically uses an unnecessary amount of energy once the aircraft is flying in a forward direction. The Swallow conception, with the variable wings, has always appealed to me for that reason. It seems to me that the great advantage of this type of aircraft is that, no matter at what level or speed it is flying, it can always be, as nearly as possible, aerodynamically perfect. For this reason, there are bound to be in the end great economies.

It is a fair estimate of the known facts to say that well before the year 2000 it will be possible for citizens in the United Kingdom to work all the week in Australia and to come home to Britain for the weekend, flying over the sea the whole way, in less time than it takes today to go from London to Edinburgh by train. We must think in terms of flying at 80,000 ft. or more and at 25 times the speed of sound. It was thought that the Swallow would fly at 1½ or 2½ times the speed of sound. Today, we have moved on. Dr. Barnes Wallis is moving on, too. We have to gaze at far horizons. At the same time, we must recognise that unless we come to some decision on the way we shall always be gazing at horizons and never have anything with which to reach them. This is the point which my hon. and gallant Friend tried to make.

Naturally, I should have like to say a lot more on this matter, but I should like to make one appeal, since probably this is the last speech that I shall make in this Parliament. In a matter like this, cannot we get away from party politics on great policy issues? Unless we give research teams some assurance that, whatever the Government, they will have a planned programme to which they can work, we will never get the full benefit of them. It is not fair to these highly skilled men to expect them to give of their best if they feel the whole time that party policy, which has been changed on completely different issues—very often social—can wreck all the work that they have done. Let us hope that that will never happen.

Mr. Mulley

As I understand, the hon. Gentleman is attacking the Government for not giving the research people this assurance. It is nothing to do with the Opposition that this brilliant idea has not been explored. It is he and his hon. Friends who are attacking the Government, and I should not want to get involved in that.

Sir H. Legge-Bourke

What I had particularly in mind in expressing that desire was the remark of the Leader of the Opposition. He is on record as having said that he wants to harness science to Socialism. Everybody knows that Socialism needs a lot more science, but heaven forbid that we should get the aircraft industry and scientists involved in it.

1.46 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Aviation (Mr. Neil Marten)

I must start by saying how much I welcome this debate. This subject of variable geometry is attractive to all those of us who are interested in aviation. I congratulate my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) on having had the good fortune to be lucky in the ballot and to have chosen this subject for discussion.

The hon. Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley) said that the aircraft procurement policy of the Government was in a sorry mess. I should like to take the opportunity to deny that completely. [An HON. MEMBER: "NO."] Whoever said it, it is not true, as was evidenced by our recent conference with the aircraft industry.

Much of this interesting debate has dealt with strategy and diplomacy. I think that the hon. Member will be the first to realise that, in the short time available to me, that is somewhat outside my terms of reference. The hon. Member criticised the Government for having no settled defence policy. Much as we should like to see it settled, I believe that defence policy is bound to go on shifting, as recent political events have made only too clear.

I think that everybody agrees that the proposition which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East put forward concerning aircraft carriers would be extremely expensive. I believe that the hon. Member for Sheffield, Park would agree with that. Many of the developments to which my hon. and gallant Friend referred are attractive, but, in the end, it all comes back to the resources of the nation and to what we can afford to devote to this or that project. Opinions vary on whether we have our projects and priorities right.

Basically, my hon. and gallant Friend criticised our failure fully to develop variable geometry and said that we let the technique of it go to America. We have the possibility of going ahead, and it is quite feasible that what we lack is a requirement from our forces for variable geometry aircraft. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence will study my hon. and gallant Friend's speech with the greatest care and will give full attention to his differences of opinon with my right hon. Friend.

The hon. Member for Sheffield, Park said that when the Labour Party returns to power he will study this speech with great interest. I suggest that, by the time that happens, the speech will be thoroughly out of date.

It is true that the TSR2 has not yet flown, but I do not think that it will be very long now. I should not be so foolish as to say in precisely which week it will fly, but we hope that it will not be long. We wish it well when it does fly. As the hon. Gentleman will recognise, it is not our custom to give the cost and number of aircraft to be ordered in the House.

For the convenience of those in the House and those who read HANSARD, I should like to say a word to get this question of variable geometry—and, after all, this debate is primarily about variable geometry—and the history of it right for the record. From 1948 to the mid-1950s the Vickers Company, with Ministry of Aviation support, carried out extensive design, laboratory and wind tunnel investigations, culminating in flight trials of large-size radio-controlled models which demonstrated the basic feasibility of sweeping wings in flight.

This work was supplemented by research and design carried out by the Vickers Company on its own account into the operational applications of the concept. These studies were led, as my hon. and gallant Friend said, by Dr. Barnes Wallis, who was for many years in the forefront of research in the variable geometry field, and it is very much due to his technical ingenuity and inventiveness that many of the problems involved have, in fact, been solved, and this we must all acknowledge. He was, of course, the designer of a supersonic bomber project called "Swallow". This was a plane with variable sweep wings, with engines on the wing tips and with no tail on the aircraft. The engines could be swivelled horizontally or perpendicularly in conjunction with wing movement.

It was quite a different thing from what the Americans are doing with the TFX. This concept of the Swallow stirred the imagination of both the public and aviation opinion. The design was considered by those at the Ministry of Aviation at the time, but it was not found to be practical, unhappily, for United Kingdom Services use. The fact that we were unable to develop this idea is no reflection on its designer, who has continued to devote his creative genius to the problems of high-speed flight, in spite of the setback to his Swallow project.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, it is important to realise that the Americans, from 1947 onwards, had themselves been engaged in research on variable sweep and that in 1951 and 1952 two American experimental aircraft made their first flights with this variable sweep. One was the Bell X5 and the other, sponsored by the United States Navy, was the Grumman design. In both these aircraft, however, the mechanical solutions of the wing sweeping requirements were so heavy and complex that the design could not be satisfactorily developed into efficient fighting vehicles.

By the mid-1950s we and the Americans had, therefore, quite independently established the feasibility but, not satisfactorily, the operational advantages of variable sweep. I think that this answers those who feel that the Americans had stolen an entirely British idea.

In 1957, the Ministry of Aviation and Vickers, under a joint programme with the Americans, got together to examine the potentialities of Dr. Barnes Wallis's Swallow proposal and to define the extent to which the variable geometry concept might offer advantage to military aircraft requirements.

Under this agreement—the terms of which, incidentally, made provision for the protection of Vickers' interests in its commercial rights and were agreed by the Vickers Company—information was freely exchanged between the three parties. However, the joint conclusion was that the Swallow design was impracticable as the basis for further development. That fact was extremely regrettable. From that moment both nations, British and American, went their own way into further research and development of this variable sweep or variable geometry project.

When our joint programme with the Americans concluded in 1960, they went on, as we now know, to develop the joint United States Air Force and United States Navy requirement, the TFX. I think that it was my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East who said that this was an American extension of a British invention. After what I have just said, I think that he will see that it is probably an American extension of an American invention, with perhaps a little bit of British "know-how" brought into it. I do not think that the Americans are barking up the wrong tree. But we must see how it works and flies.

At that time, Britain had no requirement for which the variable sweep concept conferred any special advantage. We did not give up the idea, but continued with our research. In 1962, a contract was placed with the British Aircraft Corporation for a project study of an experimental aircraft which did not, in fact, proceed to the construction stage.

Commander Courtney

Is it not a fact that the Sea Vixen replacement, before it was turned down, was envisaged as a variable geometry aircraft?

Mr. Marten

I was coming to that point.

As the House knows very strenuous efforts were made by the Ministries of Defence and Aviation to harmonise the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy requirements so that a common aircraft could be produced to meet the needs of both services for a replacement of the Hunter and Sea Vixen. In the event, as the House knows, this proved to be impracticable and it was, therefore, decided to order the P1154 for the Royal Air Force and the Phantom re-engined with the Spey engine for the Royal Navy.

This, I think, answers my hon. and gallant Friend's point. It might be argued that the requirement might have been met by a variable sweep aircraft. Indeed, variable sweep was studied in the context, but, again, it was only one of the designs put forward and I think that if we had gone for the variable sweep aircraft for the R.A.F.'s rôle the result would have been probably appreciably worse than the P1154 and could not have been in service until some years later.

A variable geometry solution might possibly have met the naval requirement alone, but, as I told the House in the Adjournment debate on the 29th April, to develop a new British aircraft to meet the naval requirement would have been very expensive and certainly could not have been justified in addition to the development of the P1154.

As to the future, I would emphasise to the House that we have by no means abandoned research on variable geometry. On the contrary, our research in this field continues as an important element of our aeronautical research programme, but our programme must always provide for research over the whole field of aeronautical science, so it is inevitable that not every research success will find immediate practical application.

I think that this comes out very well on the question of vertical jet lift. One technique in this field is vectored thrust. We have had an opportunity to exploit its practical application in the P1154. I hope that it will have a very good export potential. But the other technique, which is the multi-engine jet lift SCI, is continuing on a research basis only because we have no operational requirement for which it is suitable. I think that similar criteria can be applied to variable geometry.

We have sufficient confidence in variable geometry development to proceed with it when the appropriate application and requirement presents itself. If one or other of the Service Departments were to state a requirement for which the variable geometry concept was considered to offer an appropriate solution, we are confident that on the basis of the considerable research which has already been built up we could proceed directly to an aircraft development programme, or, as my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Harrow, East said, we could seize the opportunity. We are poised to do that, but so far we have not had that requirement. I will, nevertheless, draw the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence to what my hon. and gallant Friend has said about this in the debate.

Sir H. Legge-Bourke

Naturally, I appreciate that my hon. Friend's Department is concerned mainly with meeting the requirements of the Service Departments, but would he not agree that the impact upon the civil as well as the military field of aircraft of the variable geometry idea is quite as great?

Mr. Marten

It could be. On the civil side, it must be largely a question of commercial judgment. We are already clear about the rôles for which variable geometry offers advantages and our current research programme aims at adding to our already extensive knowledge and understanding of the concept, in addition to the possibility that we shall one day be required to apply it.

As I have said, that is the essence of the way that we should approach the question of variable geometry. It forms a substantial item on our programme for the next five years. I hope, therefore, that the House will study what has been said in this debate and have confidence that we are going ahead; and that it is not true that the Americans have taken over this scheme from the British, because they have been doing it themselves for many years in parallel with us.