HC Deb 17 May 1977 vol 932 cc236-8
Mr. Frank Allaun

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely, the Government's development of new hydrogen bombs". In The Guardian today there is a report headed "UK H-Bomb Plans Go Ahead". It states that scientists at Aldermaston are working on a miniaturised H-bomb and a new Polaris warhead. In today's Daily Mail there is another report under the headline "Mulley Confirms New H-Bombs". In this report the Ministry refuses to confirm or deny reports that the Government are trying to beat the expected ban on all nuclear tests, including underground tests. This statement follows a report occupying the front page of yesterday's Daily Mail headed "The Secret H-Bomb Race—Britain Acts to Beat Carter Ban." It states that the test at Nevada of a highly advanced H-bomb prototype has been advanced by several months and is expected soon.

Presumably this test was to have been kept secret and was to have been made without previous announcement to the House, as with earlier tests. I wonder why it should be secret. There is, unfortunately, reason to believe that the British Government are, in fact, planning a further test explosion at Nevada. When the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Barnsley (Mr. Mason), was asked for an assurance that there would be no more tests, he refused to give it.

The matter is urgent because the negotiations between President Carter and Mr. Brezhnev to stop all nuclear test explosions are now under way, and their prospects may well be damaged by such a test. Also, it undermines and conflicts with President Carter's current declared aims.

The matter is also urgent because it is not now possible to put down a Question either to the Prime Minister or to the Secretary of State for Defence that will be answered for at least a month.

Finally, the matter is important. No issue that we discuss could be more important. It is vital that detente should be extended, and such a development of new nuclear weapons increases international tension and undermines the Non-Proliferation Treaty. A practical step towards stopping the fatal nuclear arms race is to stop testing. Prohibiting tests helps to prevent the invention, development and manufacture of new weaponry, because what is the value of a new weapon that cannot be tested?

This is important to every country, but particularly so to Britain, because we are a small thickly-populated territory. We are a sitting duck and could not use this suicide weapon because we should be wiped out in instant retaliation. [HON. MEMBERS: "Too Long."] Mr. Speaker controls the proceedings of the House—nobody else. I have sought to stick strictly to the rules of the Standing Order.

Also these plans, apart from contravening Labour Party policy, are contrary to the Government's election pledge that there would be no new generation of nuclear weapons. If we are not bent on such a course, why are we carrying out tests? Nuclear weapons are not like cheese; they do not need testing to see

whether they have gone stale. For these reasons and many others I ask for the Adjournment of the House.

Mr. Speaker

The hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Allaun) was good enough to give me notice before mid-day that he intended to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 9.

The hon. Gentleman asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he thinks should have urgent consideration, namely, the Government's development of new hydrogen bombs". As the House knows, it is for me to decide not the importance of the issue but whether an emergency debate should be granted. Under Standing Order No. 9, I am directed to take account of the several factors set out in the order but to give no reason for my decision.

I have listened carefully to what the hon. Member has said, but I have to rule that his submission does not fall within the provisions of the Standing Order, and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.